Craters of the Moon National Monument and Preserve in Idaho. (National Park Service Photo

If you want to experience what it's like to visit another planet without getting in a spaceship, consider these five national park areas with out-of-this-world landscapes.

Let's start with one of the most obvious:

Craters of the Moon National Monument and Preserve

This enormous park, 400 square miles, located in Idaho definitely has a different planet-type appearance to it. Much of the landscape basically consists of undulating black mounds with really nothing else. That's because those mounds were once made with molten lava. This area has some of the best rift cracks in the world (including the deepest on earth at 800 feet), varieties of basaltic lava, ancient tree molds and lava tubes. Within this desolate landscape, you can also see fissure vents, cones, and giant rock blocks. But in

Bryce Canyon National Park. Read how you can take a "virtual hike" through this amazing landscape and four other fascinating national parks. (Source: National Park Service)

For people who are indoors but yearn to be outdoors and visit a national park, Google has teamed up with the National Park Service to give us a Virtual Guide to five fantastic, and incredibly diverse parks.

Take a hike from your computer and view stunning videos that make it appear you are actually walking on a park trail.

In these virtual tours, you walk alongside an experienced park ranger who provides a trail's eye view through five national parks along with an interesting narrative about the location.

With high-def cameras and drone footage from above, you and your mouse can climb into an ice-blue crevasse,

There are many free items available for visitors to our National Parks, including several days when admission fees are waived. Great Smoky Mountain National Park photo courtesy of National Park Service

If your resolution this year is to spend more time off the couch and on a park bench or hiking in our national parks, here are some free goodies that might keep you motivated in 2020.

Let's start with free admission.

Every year, the National Park Service issues a list of days when entrance fees are waived. This is for 110 parks that charge admission. There is no admission fee for the other 309 national park sites.

Free admission

Canyonlands National Park - Photo from NPS/Gwen Gerbe

This Labor Day as far as jobs and economic development are concerned, when there are attractions that draw more than 330 million visitors every year, there is going to be a major amount of money spent and jobs created.

The attractions we are talking about are not Disneyland or Universal Theme Parks.

They are our National Parks.

National Parks (and for that matter state, county and city parks) are a major force in our economy and support a large number of workers.

The benefits were outlined recently in a study conducted by the National Park Service: 2017 National Park Visitor Spending Effects. Economic Contributions to Local Communities, States and the Nation

U.S. Secretary of the Interior Ryan Zinke announced that

Grand Sand Dunes National Park - Photo from NP

Here is a collection of interesting national park facts to help you celebrate the National Park Service's 103rd birthday on Sun. Aug. 25.

That's the date when President Woodrow Wilson created the National Park Service Act. Since the creation of the NPS, this department now oversees more than 84 million acres of awesome natural areas and historic sites. Our parks are obviously very popular, in 2018, there were more than 318 million visitors. In 1904, there were 120,906.

The first national park established in the country is Yellowstone National Park which is located in three states - Wyoming, Montana and Idaho. That park was actually created in 1872 and in fact, is the oldest national park in the world.

Here's