The Best Places Backpacker's Editors Hiked in 2025
As Backpacker editors, we spend a lot of time researching the trips that you, our readers, should take and what you need to make them a success. So, when it comes to our own adventures, we take it pretty seriously. It’s hard to narrow down what our favorites trips were in 2025, but here goes: This year, we introduced our kids to the landscapes we love, roamed around the least-visited national park in the U.S., and celebrated a friendship’s bidecennial with a long hike.
Looking for some 2026 trip inspiration? Here are the best places we adventured this year.
Needles District, Canyonlands National Park, Utah
I might just be a desert rat at heart. After my first trip to southern Utah, I fell so in love with the place that I moved to Moab sight unseen, freelancing for the local paper for pocket change and exploring the cliffs and canyons on my days off. I’ve long since moved on, but I keep finding reasons to come back. This year, I gave my 6-year-old son his introduction to the landscape I love so much on a three-day, 11-mile loop through Canyonlands’ Needles District.
Starting at the Salt Flat campground, we crossed the scrubby, broad floor of Wooden Shoe Canyon before climbing to a broad sandstone ridge. That’s where the real hiking started: We dropped down, via a ladder bolted to the rock, into tnarrow, snaking Lost Canyon and followed it, navigating through sandy washes and tumbled boulders. For the next two days, we got a sampler of the desert’s best, navigating through thick groves of cottonwoods and edging, hand in hand, along ledges that guarded hundred-foot drops. We watched bats flit at dusk over the few potholes that held water as they snapped mosquitoes out of the air, and witnessed the arroyo that bordered our last-night campsite flood in minutes during a thunderstorm.
On the last morning, we stood on the edge of Wooden Shoe Canyon once again, watching the sun rise over the cliffs. When I glanced over and saw his face as he watched it, I knew that I had hooked him on the desert too. —Adam Roy, Editor-in-Chief
Nahanni River, Northwest Territories, Canada
Getting to the put-in for the Nahanni River was an adventure in itself. It took me four flights and two days to get to Fort Simpson in the Northwest Territories, the jumping-off point for trips into Nahanni National Park. Then, after waiting overnight for the weather to clear, we were back in an aircraft—this one a small, four-seater float plane. But as we began our descent to our landing spot just above Nailicho, a thundering, 315-foot drop that guards the start to most trips down the river, I knew it would be worth it. Over the next several days we spent rafting the river’s four sheer main canyons, we saw exactly one other group—another group of guided canoeists who launched with us and who we passed the first afternoon.
By day, we floated, ran rapids in inflatables we’d brought along, and listened to our guides from Nahanni River Adventures relay the human history of the river, which began thousands of years ago when the Dene first traveled the Nahanni to fish and trap and more recently included a few spooky cases of prospectors who ventured into the canyon and reappeared without their heads. By night—if you can call the grey twilight that passes for evening in the subarctic in early August that—we shared drinks and stories on the river’s banks and took walks to check out fossil-encrusted cliffs. (Pro tip: If you want to truly enjoy happy hour, bring a bug shirt and head net. The mosquitoes and biting flies are legendary.) By the time the canyon walls receded and the river transformed into a broad, lazy braid, I felt like I had squirreled away enough summer memories to get me through the longest winter. —AR
Gates of the Arctic National Park, Alaska
This summer, I finally made my first trip to Alaska with a visit to the least-visited national park. Located above the Arctic Circle in Alaska’s interior, Gates of the Arctic is home to grizzlies, caribou herds, wolverines and more. There are no trails or infrastructure within the park, and the remote nature makes just getting there a challenge before the actual hiking even begins. My hiking partners and I flew into Anaktuvuk Pass, a tiny village inside the park that makes for a more affordable entry point than hiring a bush plane. From there, we spent five days traveling across boggy tundra up a wide glacier-carved valley. It’s an incredible place to witness the scale and solitude that’s unique to Alaska and challenge skills like routefinding and hiking through adverse weather.
The flight back to Fairbanks after our hike was both jaw-dropping and humbling; with almost 8.5 million acres of terrain in the park, from staggering granite peaks to braided glacier-fed rivers, it was easy to start daydreaming of a return trip to see even more of it. —Zoe Gates, Senior Editor
Three Fingers Lookout, Washington
My favorite backpacking trips are the ones that challenge me without veering into Type 2 fun. My hike to Washington’s Three Fingers Lookout in July struck that perfect balance. With an 8-mile mountain bike approach, overgrown singletrack, a few steep snow crossings, and an exposed ladder climb to the lookout itself, this hike wasn’t a gimme. I felt equipped for each obstacle along the way, which stretched me enough to feel a deep sense of pride when I reached the summit. An all-time sunset above the clouds was simply the cherry on top of a perfect day in the mountains. From the lookout, I took in 360-degree views of Mt. Baker, Puget Sound, and the endless jagged peaks of the North Cascades. Plus, I did this hike during peak salmonberry and huckleberry season. Nothing tops free trail snacks. —ZG
Catalina Island, California
This summer, my friend and I celebrated the 20-year anniversary of our friendship by hiking the Trans-Catalina Trail together. We had camped there together in middle school as Girl Scouts, so it was only fitting that we return for a full traverse of the island. Every part of this trip was a beautiful memory. We made friendship bracelets and laughed all night by the campground firepits. Plus, the Little Harbor, Parson’s Landing, and Two Harbors campsites were either directly on the Pacific or steps from it, so we swam in the ocean each day. Each day on the trail sent us through a different ecosystem, from rolling grassy hills to an arid desert to the ocean shoreline. Even though the constants were unrelentingly steep hills, the evolving scenery kept us entertained.
We took this trail at a moderate pace with a goal of enjoying the experience more than breaking any records. We even stopped for a zero day at Little Harbor, just to have the day to swim and hike around the area. (I also wrote about how our decision to sleep in really improved my experience on the trail.)
One quirk of this island is the bison that roam wild. At Black Jack campground, I got out of my tent pretty early to stretch, and I saw a herd of six bison passing through the morning mist. That scene is something I will never forget. I celebrated that moment, and the end of a successful hike, with a Buffalo Milk cocktail at a restaurant in Two Harbors. Note: There is no buffalo milk in the cocktail. Just lots of alcohol and whipped cream. —Emma Veidt, Associate Editor
