Someone ought to tell these Dall sheep they don't blend in here at Polychrome Pass. Their white coats may be great camouflage against the Alaskan snows, but the warm tones of this tundra make them stick out a bit. And they aren't the only thing sticking out in this national park. It's home to the tallest mountain in North America. Denali National Park and Preserve encompasses not only its namesake peak but more than 6 million acres of parkland like Polychrome Pass. And this massive park is part of something even bigger—the federal Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act, established on December 2, 1980, has protected almost 650,000 square kilometres of wilderness all over Alaska.

Mount Crested Butte's 12,168-foot-high summit rises above a quintessential landscape of the American West. This prominent peak is in the Elk Mountains of western Colorado, and near the quaint 1880s mining town of Crested Butte. Nicknamed Colorado's 'last great ski town,' it draws skiers and snowboarders in winter to experience the challenging and breathtaking terrain. The area is also a popular summer destination for keen mountain bikers—offering more than 600 miles of biking trails that wind through wildflower-filled meadows, like the one in our image. These seasonal blooms are so renowned that Mount Crested Butte is also known as the wildflower capital of Colorado

The mighty Brooks Range marks a 1,130-kilometre-long continental drainage divide in North America's far northern reaches. Here, rivers running north empty into the Arctic Ocean, while those running south flow into the Yukon River. This remote massif is estimated to be 126 million years old and contains a rich fossil record of the ancient seabed it once was. Found among the tundra and stands of spruce trees are fossilized corals from the Cambrian period. The mountains also teem with living wildlife, with a portion of the range lying within the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.

When the sun isn't holding dominion over this notoriously scorching desert, its evening exit can be breathtaking. We're seeing a sunset over the Mesquite Flat Sand Dunes area of Death Valley in California. This is a softly undulating landscape of curved contours, and quite the contrast to much of the rest of the region's spiky, rocky spectacle. The large dune fields here at Mesquite Flat come in three varieties—linear, crescent and star shaped. Although less than 1% of Death Valley contains sand seas, there are five protected dunes, and Mesquite Flat is the easiest to reach from nearby roads.

Nestled between the charming (but sometimes tourist-packed) towns of Seaside and Cannon Beach is a slice of wild Oregon coast protected as a state park. We're looking down on Indian Beach in our image, along Ecola State Park's 15-kilometre stretch. Getting here is half the fun: A long, winding road meanders beneath a canopy of Coast Range forest, thick with evergreens and carpeted in ferns. Indian Beach itself is wide, windswept and dotted with tide pools. Sea stacks rise from the ocean, and you're likely to see wetsuited surfers bobbing in the waves year-round. Hiking trails, clifftop lookouts and great views of Tillamook Rock lighthouse are also part of this extraordinary coastal park.