(CNN) -- Naturalist Beth Pratt has been exploring and celebrating wildlife since she was a child, whether discovering the great whales of Cape Cod with her parents or creating a special luxury habitat for her backyard frogs. As a young girl she gazed with longing at photos of grizzly bears and wolves, and vowed to see the charismatic mega-fauna of the West. She realized her dream in her 20-year career in environmental leadership has included work at Yosemite and Yellowstone national parks. She's the director of the National Wildlife Federation's California office, living just outside Yosemite. Pratt has wandered extensively throughout Yosemite's backcountry, hiked the John Muir Trail, swam the mile-long Tenaya Lake in Yosemite and run the Cape Cod Marathon with her father and "survived" (her word) the Tioga Pass Run: a 12.4-mile trek entirely uphill gaining 3,000 feet in elevation to arrive at the entrance of Yosemite.
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An annual rite of spring is hiking the Gaylor Lakes trail at Yosemite National Park
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Mount Washburn is the best trail in Yellowstone in terms of bang for wildlife buck, naturalist says
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Children can search the beaches of Cape Cod for prehistoric horseshoe crabs
When I worked in @placeholder and people asked me what to do if they only had a day in the park, I would recommend the Mount Washburn hike.