Best hikes, treks, tramps in the world.
In fact, we rank Harder Ridge our #1 day hike in the world.
Xander is a Swiss hiking expert.
This is his favourite hike in Switzerland.
They did not make it all the way. Too slow. So had to scramble down to the lake.
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I climbed Kilimanjaro February 2026. Epic.
BUT climbing one of the many alternatives might be better and far less expensive.
Eibhlis Gale-Coleman lays out some of the options:
Mount Ngaliema is no mean feat. Perched in theย Rwenzori Mountains National Park, it stands at 16,761 feet (5,109 meters), and is the third-highest peak in Africa. The terrain begins in rainforest and ends with a glacier traverse that necessitates crampons: Arrive expecting a pole-assisted trudge, and youโll be overwhelmed. …
Kraig Adams calls this adventure perhaps the hardest and longest hike of his life.
It’s high on my own life list. Cost and logistics are challenging.
By coincidence, I met guide Ian Taylor, the both of us finishing Kilimanjaro on the same day. I talked to him about possibly signing up for one of his K2 & Gondogoro La adventures in 2027.
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Here’s another edit with more specific information.
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Trip report by BestHike editor Rick McCharles.
Disclaimer โ There are MANY other mountains to climb in Africa which are much less expensive. Any one of those would be good acclimatization before Kili.
I hiked Kilimanjaro February 2026 on the Machameย Route organized by Eric Hanson.
Eric is one of the top hiking YouTubers. He’ll be documenting our trip in coming weeks.
In the meantime, I’m posting some photos here.
We had 22 hikers. 18 of us made both summits. That’s about typical for the Machame Route. It went well for me. My 3 weeks training & acclimatizing in Ecuador prior to this trip was a good idea.
Age & fitness matter much less than the ability to acclimatize to altitude.
It took me 68-years to finally get to Kilimanjaro. The eldest my African guide got to the summit was 79.
We had another in our group age-66.
Truly impressive is one of our assistant guides who’s been to the summit over 200 times over 31 years. He’s age 64.
Here we are โ clean & keen โ at the start of the 7 day adventure.
In fact, it was a party from the start as many who had hiked with Eric in the past joined for Kili. I was simply an addition to a large group, many who knew one another. This is a very social adventure โ shared suffering.
Eric was our American guide. Freddy our African guide. Both responsible for keeping us safe. It was these two who’d make the decision whether or not you were healthy enough to keep climbing.
Those who decided to go down were unable to acclimatize quickly enough. We had daily blood oxygen tests.
Three decided to walk out. One took a helicopter, hoping she will recoup the $4100 cost through insurance.
New to me on a trail was the singing and dancing. Non-stop. To the top.
Oddly, all 7 days we had the same weather. Some sort of micro-climate.
Morning clear. Sunny to start the hiking day. Snow, sleet, and hail in the early afternoon. Clearing by dinner time. Clear skies at night. Kili summit clear at dawn.
We added and removed layers non-stop during the day.
Each day we spent some time hiking through clouds.
We mostly had clear skies at night. The iPhone 16 Pro is terrific at night photography on a tripod.
I’d paid a little extra to have a tent to myself. It was fairly comfortable โ though many of our tent sites were far from level. ๐
Kili is a monstrous lump of a mountain. Much bigger than it appears on the horizon.
I’d signed up for Kili in 2020 with Dave and Kraig โ cancelled due to Covid.
When I heard in 2025 that Eric Hanson was hosting a climb, I signed up instantly.
His wife was coming so I knew it would be a quality trip. ๐
Food was plentiful and basic. Especially SOUP and potato dishes.
We saw very little animal life. Four-striped grass mouse. And something like a shrew.
Birds aplenty, however. We lived side-by-side with aggressive White-necked Ravens in every camp.
And we did see one Auger Buzzard.
We were happy to see two kinds of monkeys. But both were at lower slopes, close to the start and finishing gates.
Baboons and velvet monkeys have been spotted, but rarely.
This bird took a dump in my backpack. ๐
Vegetation was much more interesting as we climbed through so many different ecological zones.
I do love thistles.
We had great views over to nearby Meru volcano. When you see hikers posed like this, you know they are searching for line-of-sight mobile phone reception. ๐
The Machame Route was crowded when I was there. We often had long lines of hikers & porters.
Camps are crowded and littered.
Personally, I felt the portable toilets provided weren’t great. I preferred squatting over a hole in the concrete in the permanent toilet buildings.
Hygiene is not top of mind for any of the guiding companies. In particular, I was surprised alcohol gel was not constantly provided.
That said, nobody in my group got sick from water or food.
CRUX of Kilimanjaro is summit night. One of the toughest hiking days any of us could recall. I felt perfect. No pain. No problems … when starting.
Wake at midnight. Hot drinks 12:30pm. Start up at 1am.
It was a slow, cold trudge until dawn.
We had an ideal view of the changing light.
Way above the clouds.
We finally reached the first summit peak. And on perhaps another 35 minutes to the highest peak.
I took a LOT of photos and video up there. Most impressive were the odd, receding glaciers.
That was the FUN part.
Guides hustled us down as quickly as possible to avoid altitude sickness. We climbed down 8000 feet, not getting into low camp until 6pm or so. I ascended & descended for 16 hours, grabbing 1 hour sleep around noon.
Sore knees. Sore toes. And cramping quads.
Most would agree that the porters, guides, and staff were the most impressive takeaway from this adventure. We probably had over 100 staff taking care of us over the week. And these folks will do positively anything you request.
Back at the hotel, we celebrated with alcohol and devoured a full roast goat. Delicious.
A hiker died on Kilimanjaro while I was there. Reported heart attack.
On December 24, 2025, a rescue helicopter crashed, killing all 5 people on board. Two were hikers being evacuated.
10โ20 deaths annually out of 30,000+ climbers.
I wrongly thought Kilimanjaro would be easy for me. It wasn’t.
We hiked Death Valley in late December on a (relatively) cool day.
Golden Canyon to the Red Cathedral out-and-back is likely the most popular hike.
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We did the Golden Canyon to Gower Gulch Loop.
About 4 miles in about 2 hours.
Overconfident, we left the map in the car and forgot to download the app for offline. Oops.
Signage is minimal and sometimes confusing. At one junction we waited for other hikers to confirm direction.
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Highly recommended โย but not in the heat of summer.
BestHike editor Rick McCharles
The best months to hike in Ecuador areย June to Septemberย andย December to January, which align with the region’s two primary dry seasons, offering clearer skies and more stable, albeit windy, weather.
JuneโAugust is ideal for trekking, while NovemberโFebruary is often preferred for climbing volcanoes like Cotopaxi.ย
My first trip to Ecuador was January / February 2026.
Locals told me it had been rainier than usual โย with rain starting almost every afternoon. Normally stopping around sunset.
I was happy with my itinerary and consider myself something of a veteran now. ๐
Acclimatization is critical. Therefore I recommend you start with this sequence of hikes:
I did all of those.
If I had more time, next would have been a summit attempt to either the top of Cotopaxi 5,897 m (19,347 ft) or Chimborazo 6,263 m (20,548 ft). Chimborazo summit is the farthest point on Earth’s surface from the Earth’s center due to its location along the planet’sย equatorial bulge.
Finally, Ecuador may be the least expensive of the great hiking destinations of the world. Get planning. ๐
Trip report by BestHike editor Rick McCharles.
A super popular acclimatization hike is a steep, 1,000-meter climb up loose volcanic scree to the base camp of one of the world’s most iconic peaks.
Accessible as a day trip from Quito or โ better โ via surrounding lodges like Secret Garden Cotopaxi, which is what I did.
We started early morning when the weather is generally better. Picked up mountain bikes en route.
It’s a beautiful part of the world.
One highlight was spotting a “Andean Wolf” on the drive up. And again on the way down the mountain. It looks more like a long-legged fox.
From the parking lot, it’s 45 minutes to 1.5 hours uphill. (Much faster back down to your vehicle.)
Most continue on to reach the glacier at about 5000m.
We were all checking our devices to see if we’d reached 5000m. We did.
One photographer from South Africa had never seen snow. He decided to climb right into the glacier. … Probably not the safest decision.
We then dropped down to the Base Camp refuge (refugio) at 4,864 meters (15,953 feet) for a hot drink and/or soup.
A festive vibe.
We slid back down the mountain in soft, safe ash.
A simple, but memorable day hike.
Safe but exciting to finish was rolling down the mountain road on bikes.
Highly recommended. BUT we had one in our group who felt altitude enough to only go as far as the refuge. That’s typical for most groups. Be cautious.
related – Brooke Beyond trip report
Trip report by BestHike editor Rick McCharles.
We signed on for a climb of Rumiรฑahui Central with Secret Garden Cotopaxi.
Spoiler. Lexi, Tahel, and myself all made it to 4,643m. Super happy here. Our guide was terrific.
Rumiรฑahui is considered a lead-up to Cotopaxi (5,897m) and then Chimborazo (6,263โ6,310m).
Rumiรฑahui is a dormant, heavily eroded stratovolcano 4,721 metres (15,489 ft) above sea level.
Situated in the Andes mountains 40 km south of Quito, Ecuador, it is overshadowed by its famous neighbour Cotopaxi.
This mountain is in Cotopaxi National Park, so we drove directly towards the big peak. Excellent weather early morning.
We parked at Lake Limpiopungo at approximately 3,850m. Many different species of birds alight here.
Headed to that central peak.
We saw rabbits at the beginning while climbing up through paramo.
And condors floating in the updraft.
On the way down, our guide spotted wild horses below.
We had amazing views of Cotopaxi.
I call it a scramble because this mountain is quite jagged. We used our hands quite a bit at the top. Tahel put spare socks on her hands. I used a buff for protection. None of us had opted to carry gloves.
Check this rugged mountaineer.
Ready for Kilimanjaro, coming up next.
The most surprising moment of the trip was having a caracara land on the summit just as we were celebrating.
A bit slow getting to the top, we actually ran down much of the mountain as Tahel had to catch a bus back to Quito at 3pm.
We stopped to chat with this group at 1pm. Just starting up.
Well … they had horrific hard rainfall in the afternoon. You really want to finish your hiking by 2pm in the Andes.
Click PLAY or watch our adventure on YouTube.
Trip report by BestHike editor Rick McCharles.
I flew to Ecuador for 3 weeks hiking & climbing in preparation for Kilimanjaro.
A good decision.
Logistics getting to and from trailheads is complicated in this nation.
BEST for me was adventuring out of Secret Garden Cotopaxi Hostel โ perhaps my favourite hostel in the world. At around 3,800 metres (12,500 feet), you’ll feel some altitude symptoms for sure if coming from sea level. I’d been in Ecuador for about 9 days and still had minor headaches.
Most popular is a 3-day, 2-night package starting at $120 with transportation from Quito, the capital.
That includes two free guided hikes:
In some ways, the short Waterfall hike is challenging.
You must wear provided rubber boots that don’t have much traction. It’s not uncommon for new visitors at altitude to fall into the muddy creek.
Each day some fool(s) decide to swim the waterfall. But not this fool. Not this day.
The Pasochoa summit hike to 4200m (13,776 ft) is legit high altitude training. Even though you start directly from the hotel.
Best pay attention to the warnings of your very experienced guide.
The start can be muddy and slippery. Some wear rubber boots for the first 45 minutes, or so.
From there, you switch to hiking shoes and climb up through paramo grasslands and primary cloud forest.
Very popular, the route is blazed.
Of course there are terrific views back to the higher volcanoes.
Everyone agreed, the highlight was walking with hostel dogs.
An easy day hike โ IF you are acclimatized to altitude. Most days, some who start don’t make it to the top.
60 Minutes has much been in the news of late. New CBS News editor-in-chief, Bari Weiss pulled a segment on President Trump’s deportations just hours before broadcast. It was widely seen as political pandering to Trump. His move to deport people from the USA to the El Salvador prison CECOT, is likely a human rights abuse and potentially criminal.
If you believe in Freedom of the Press as guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution, know that the episode showed on Global TV Canada and was widely available around the world. By trying to protect the President, Bari Weiss ended up bringing even more attention to the potential criminal act.
BUT their feature on the Sherpas of Everest is quite good, bringing public attention to these important guides and porters.
Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.
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