Places You Earn Step by Step
Some places refuse to make it easy on trekkers. Instead, they demand something of you even if it’s only sweat and time. These are the places that don’t come with parking lots or paved trails; you have to earn the summit. And the strange, wonderful part about this is by the time you arrive at the top, you’ve changed just enough to be able to appreciate them. Here are twenty must-see spots only accessible by foot.
1. Machu Picchu via the Inca Trail, Peru
Sure, you can take the train, but the real way in is the Inca Trail, the same Quechua once walked. The 26-mile trek takes four days and involves seemingly endless steps through mist, stone, and jungle. You wake before dawn, climb into thin air, and reach the Sun Gate just as the first light hits those impossible terraces.
2. Kalalau Valley, Kauai, Hawaii
The Napali Coast doesn’t hand itself over easily. It involves eleven miles of slick mud, cliff-hugging turns, and ocean views so breathtaking they feel artificially generated. At the end lays your reward: Kalalau Beach, remote and golden, where waterfalls drop straight onto the sand.
California Cow from Seattle, USA on Wikimedia
3. Cinque Terre, Italy
Five pastel-colored villages are stitched together by a footpath. You can ride the train, but the trail winds through vineyards and lemon trees, leading up stone steps so old they’ve forgotten who carved them. Vernazza glows warmly come sunset, and the gelato hits differently after braving the long trail.
4. The Wave, Arizona, USA
This sandstone swirl in the desert looks Photoshopped, but it isn’t. The catch is that the trail has no guidepost, just a seven-mile round-trip trek through heatwaves and silence. Permits are selectively issued, but those who make the trek talk about rocks that look like water frozen mid-pour.
5. Petra through the Siq, Jordan
You don’t just walk into Petra; you emerge upon it. The narrow canyon walls squeeze tight as the light flickers red and gold, and then suddenly there it is: the Treasury, carved straight into rose-colored rock.
6. Angels Landing, Zion National Park, USA
The trail zigzags up a sandstone spine no wider than a dinner table, with 1,500 feet of nothing on either side. There are chains to cling to, sure, but that doesn’t stop the views of the bottom from making your stomach flip over itself.
7. Trolltunga, Norway
This cliff, meaning “Troll’s Tongue” in Norwegian, juts out 2,300 feet above a glacial lake. It’s a ten-hour round trip on foot, but when you step out onto that sliver of rock, with the mist curling below and the fjords stretching off into forever, you feel like you would have walked twenty hours if you needed to.
8. Ciudad Perdida, Colombia
Older than Machu Picchu, this archaeological site lies hidden in the Sierra Nevada. It takes four to six days on foot to reach it, crossing rivers in a climate so humid the air feels like soup. Along the way, small Kogi villages greet you quietly. Then, at the top, stone terraces rise from the jungle like a mirage.
9. Mount Hua Shan, China
The “Plank Walk in the Sky” isn’t a metaphor. Trekkers must navigate wooden boards bolted into cliffside over a thousand-foot void. Pilgrims have walked this route for centuries to reach the temple on top. You move slow, heart pounding, and somewhere between fear and awe, peace settles over you.
10. Skellig Michael, Ireland
A thousand stone steps lead trekkers up a sea-crag island where monks once lived in beehive huts. There are no vehicles to ferry you up, no handrails—just Atlantic wind and puffins for company. When you reach the top, a prayer of gratitude almost invariably bursts from your lips.
11. The Camino de Santiago, Spain
This isn’t a single hike but a pilgrimage of hundreds of miles through villages, vineyards, and quiet chapels. The magic isn’t the destination; it’s the rhythm of boots on road and the strangers who become friends along the way.
12. The Subway, Zion National Park, USA
This trail may be less famous than Angels Landing, but it’s a whole lot wilder. Along the way, you wade through cold streams, scramble over boulders, and duck through sandstone tunnels carved by time and water. The light inside these rock formations glows green and gold, like stained glass made of earth.
John Fowler from Placitas, NM, USA on Wikimedia
13. Mount Bromo, Indonesia
You start this trail before dawn, flashlight in hand, with volcanic ash crunching underfoot. As you walk, the horizon blushes pink, and as you approach the peak, you see the sulfuric smoke spilling from the crater’s lip.
14. Taktsang Monastery, Bhutan
Built into a cliff 10,000 feet above the valley floor, this monastery is only reachable by foot or mule. The trail zigzags through pine forest and prayer flags. At the top, the monastery clings to the rocks as though anchored by sheer willpower.
15. The Narrows, Zion National Park, USA
Yes, Zion again. Although to tackle this hike, you have to wade through the Virgin River up to your waist, the canyon walls pressing close. Some moments it’s quiet enough to hear your own heartbeat. Other times, you find yourself gasping at how cold the water is.
16. Huayhuash Circuit, Peru
This hike consists of eleven days looping through the Andes, passing across snow-covered peaks and alongside turquoise lakes in air so thin you struggle to catch your breath. You might go hours without seeing another person, experiencing only the sound of the wind moving across the rocks.
17. Grand Canyon’s Havasu Falls, Arizona, USA
Ten miles down into this canyon, the red rock gives way to turquoise water. Havasu Falls looks like a place reserved for postcards, not people. You set up camp, and the night sky fills with stars so sharp it feels like they could cut.
LOGAN WEAVER | @LGNWVR on Unsplash
18. Neuschwanstein Castle, Germany
Everyone sees it from the road, but few take the long walk through the Pöllat Gorge below it. You pass along wooden bridges stretching across roaring waterfalls, surrounded on all sides by the scent of pine.
Kimberly Piersdorf on Unsplash
19. Laugavegur Trail, Iceland
This alien landscape is littered with lava fields and steaming rivers. The ground itself hisses and sighs beneath your boots. It takes four days to cross this ancient landscape and is one of the only hikes where you can boil noodles in a hot spring at camp.
20. Mount Fuji, Japan
This is more a pilgrimage than a hike. You start at night to reach the summit by sunrise, walking among a quiet crowd of fellow pilgrims wearing headlamps. The air thins, the temperature drops, but when dawn spills across the clouds below, it’s like witnessing the first sunrise ever.
