“I need my own personal expedition planner,” a friend said to me the other day at a party. “I want to plan biking and hiking trips but don’t know where to start.” I know the feeling.
I could try to answer all the questions that turn up in post comments asking about bike rides, river trips, and trekking routes, but a much better strategy would be to let the folks who really know these things share their wisdom and experience. Here, my favorite authorities on active adventure.
1. Hike Bike Travel Based in British Columbia but as peripatetic as they come, Leigh McAdam (on Twitter as @hikebiketravel) offers free itineraries and guides to hiking and biking all over the world, from a bike tour of Vietnam to a sea kayaking trip in Tahiti. Pore over her list of trips and you’ll have your vacations planned for the next ten years.
2. Waterblogged The blog of the O.A.R.S. adventure travel company, Waterblogged is a go-to authority on all things river-related. Posts and trips guides cover everything from class V whitewater rafting to placid lake kayaking. While most of the coverage focuses on the U.S., there are also destinations further afield from Alaska to the Galapagos.
3. The Hiking Center A seat-of-the-pants operation based out of the San Francisco Bay Area, the hiking center (and it’s twitter alter-ego, @thehikingcenter), always has loads of tips and great deals on gear. There’s also a great list of links, forums and message boards, so those looking for hiking buddies will find lots of help.
4. Total Escape Primarily a California resource, Total Escape should be nature lovers’ first stop for information about camping, hiking, backpacking, and other outdoor adventures in the West’s many national and state parks and wilderness areas. Check back regularly for lots of seasonal tips such as best waterfalls, wildflower hikes, swimming holes, and fall color viewing spots.
5. A Little Adrift Even if you can’t drop everything and backpack around the world, this colorful blog for RTW backpackers will make you feel a few of those thrills vicariously. Author Shannon O’Donnell offers packing lists, video clips, a photo gallery, and categorizes her posts neatly for easy browsing. Her tweets (@ShannonRTW) have a wonderful you-are-there immediacy, too.
The perfect “base camp” for outdoor adventures in California’s Sierra Nevada? Believe it or not, the Travelodge in Tahoe City is as close to the lakeshore as you can get and has a great hot tub with a view of the lake.
Very cool list of blogs. I'm inspired to get outside more just reading about them, I imagine reading the blogs themselves will catapult me out the door!
thanks for pointing us to some of your favorites, Melanie. it's a great list.Do you know the Walk Northern Ireland site? not exactly a travel planner, but run by a group of NI outdoors businesses, lots of goood information and photos.
Interesting. There are so many resources available now, but if you don't know about them, you can't use them, so thanks for this!
Thanks for these great resources. I'm always wondering about how to find great outdoor adventures. Now I have no excuse!
What a great collection of blogs! Thanks for posting these. I'll be interested in reading what they suggest for my region, Cape Cod.
Thanks for the suggestion, Kerry; I'm really impressed with the wealth of resources for walking the British Isles; I think I'm going to do a separate post on this and will mention Walk Northern Ireland; it looks great!
Great resources! Thanks so much for these links. It's always handy to get recommendations to separate the internet wheat from the chaff.
Thank you for these recommendations – they sound great. I'd love to hear any recommendations you might have for East Coast-based adventures sometime, too!
Thank you Melanie for the shout out! I was fairly disconnected until I got home yesterday -hiking the West Highland Way in Scotland and the Cumbria Way in the Lake District of England – with guides to follow.
I'm going to check out Hike Bike Travel. I'm finding that as my kids get older we can do more adventurous vacations. Thanks for this list.
Look forward to checking out some of these cool sounding links for my next active adventure, hopefully some time this fall. Wanna come with?
Dear Leigh,
Those trips sound wonderful; I haven't been to Scotland in years but my last trip there was very memorable. Can't wait to see the guides!
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