By Michael Lanza
It is one of those unfortunate inevitabilities of life, like death and taxes: Occasionally on backpacking trips you will hike past one of the most sublime patches of wilderness real estate you have ever laid eyes on, a spot so idyllic you can already see your tent pitched there and you standing outside it, warm mug in your hands, watching a glorious sunset. But it’s early and your plan entails hiking farther before you stop for the day—not camping there. Or your permit isn’t for that site. Or even worse, you are looking for a campsite, but someone else has already occupied this little corner of Heaven.
Disappointment is an awfully large pill to swallow, especially if you know you may never get back to that place. Then again, you might make a note on your map and return there someday. Goals are a powerful motivator.
My story “Tent Flap With a View: 25 Favorite Backcountry Campsites” has photos and descriptions of the best spots in the wilderness where I’ve ever spent a night over the past three decades, including many years as a field editor for Backpacker magazine and running this blog (and I recently updated that story). So it seems fitting to spotlight the best camps I never had but wish I did—all of them places potentially awaiting your tent.
Just make sure you get there before someone else grabs it.
Hi, I’m Michael Lanza, creator of The Big Outside. Click here to sign up for my FREE email newsletter. Join The Big Outside to get full access to all of my blog’s stories. Click here for my e-guides to classic backpacking trips. Click here to learn how I can help you plan your next trip.
This list grows every year—an inevitable outcome of backpacking frequently—giving you more ideas for trips to take. The descriptions below include links to stories at The Big Outside about those trips, with more images and information about planning them. Most of those stories about trips, and other stories at my blog, require a paid subscription to read in full, although you don’t need a subscription to purchase any of my e-guides or my Custom Trip Planning.
Please share anything you know about these campsites in the comments section at the bottom of this story; I try to respond to all comments.
Table of Contents
Hamilton Lakes, Sequoia National Park, CA
Granted, there are a lot of great campsites in the High Sierra. But some really do stand out even from the many extraordinary sites—in fact, two of our camps on this Sequoia trip made my list of 25 favorite backcountry campsites.
After a morning hike along a stretch of the High Sierra Trail that traverses hundreds of feet above the cliff-flanked canyon of the Middle Fork Kaweah River, we reached the largest of the Hamilton Lakes (lead photo at top of story), nestled in a bowl of granite at 8,235 feet, just in time for a long lunch break. Everyone took a swim in the invigorating water, but mostly we just soaked up the panorama of jagged peaks rising to over 12,000 feet that surround the lake.
See my story about that 40-mile, family backpacking trip, “Heavy Lifting: Backpacking Sequoia National Park,” with lots of photos and a video.
Get the right pack for you. See my picks for “The 10 Best Backpacking Packs”
and the best ultralight backpacks.
Alaska Basin, Teton Crest Trail, WY
There’s truly not a bad place to pitch a tent in all of Grand
Teton National Park—and certainly not even a mediocre spot along the Teton
Crest Trail. In fact, my list of 25
favorite backcountry campsites includes two along
the TCT. But simply because I’ve always been successful at getting my desired campsites
on my backcountry permit, I have always hiked through the one area along the
TCT that lies outside the national park and doesn’t require a permit for
camping: Alaska Basin.
But I’ve hiked through it enough times to realize what I’m missing. The two campsites shown in these photos happen to be perfect perches we passed that lie just off the TCT in the basin. Both have broad, flat areas of clean granite with amazing 360-degree panoramas of the mountains and cliffs surrounding Alaska Basin. That’s why I’ve recommended Alaska Basin as a campsite depending on the type of hiking itinerary people are seeking when I provide custom trip planning for the TCT.
See my story about my most-recent trip on the TCT, “A
Wonderful Obsession: Backpacking the Teton Crest Trail.”
Get my Teton Crest Trail e-guide or my custom trip planning for the TCT.
Liberty Lake, Ruby Crest Trail, NV
On the last afternoon of my family’s backpacking trip on Nevada’s Ruby Crest Trail, a steady uphill climb deposited us at the edge of Liberty Lake, a cobalt eye tucked tightly within a shoreline of granite slabs, patches of evergreen forest, and a talus mountainside. We followed the trail around and above the lake, where we stood on a ledge overlooking the lake and the long chain of the Ruby Mountains stretching into the distance (lead photo at top of story). Although camping there didn’t fit neatly into our four-day itinerary, it was easy to see why other backpackers had set up camp nearby.
Liberty Lake was not the only highlight of an approximately 36-mile, south-to-north traverse of the Ruby Crest Trail. We enjoyed a campsite on another beautiful alpine lake, wildflowers in bloom, relatively few other backpackers, and long stretches of hiking above 10,000 feet, traversing an almost treeless alpine zone for miles.
See my story about my family’s trip, “Backpacking the Ruby Crest Trail—A Diamond in the Rough,” at The Big Outside.
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The Narrows, Zion National Park, UT
Rather than pick one of the campsites in Zion’s Narrows that a friend and I hiked past—we stayed in campsite one, which made my list of 25 favorite backcountry campsites—I have to give all of the 11 other designated campsites in The Narrows a collective spot on this list.
On the second day of an overnight, top-to-bottom backpacking trip of The Narrows, we checked out campsites two through 12, and I eventually gave up on the idea of picking a favorite. Each one sits within sight and earshot of the burbling river, below sheer, multi-colored walls rising hundreds of feet to a ribbon of sky overhead. Some may have a little more space or some other appeal; but given the location, any one of them guarantees you an incomparable night.
See my story “Luck of the Draw, Part 2: Backpacking Zion’s Narrows.”
Do this trip right using my e-guide “The Complete Guide to Backpacking Zion’s Narrows.”
Indian Ridge, Yosemite National Park
On our first night in the backcountry during a four-day, 45-mile hike in Yosemite, a friend and I carried water up onto Indian Ridge, on Yosemite Valley’s North Rim, and found a great campsite a short walk from an unnamed dome overlooking a panorama that took in Half Dome and distant mountains to the south. We watched a sunset linger until the final light of day dripped from the sky.
But not long after hitting the trail the next morning, we saw where we wished we had camped. A little farther down Indian Ridge, the terrain opens up and flat spots abound just off the trail—where we saw no other backpackers. We had a much closer and more spectacular view looking directly at the huge Northwest Face of Half Dome just across the deep gulf of the Valley. Park regulations require camping at least a half-mile from the North Rim of Yosemite Valley—which is easy to achieve and have plenty of spots to choose from on Indian Ridge—and more significantly, you have to carry water up there.
But I don’t know of another spot in the backcountry where you can camp with that kind of view of Yosemite Valley.
See my feature story about that trip, “Yosemite’s Best-Kept Secret Backpacking Trip.”
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Island Lake and Peak Lake, Wind River Range, WY
Take a long walk in the Winds and you can
hardly swing an extended tent pole without hitting a lake or tarn. When two
friends and I backpacked a roughly 41-mile loop in the Winds, I deliberately planned
a route that included a night in Titcomb Basin, where lakes shimmer below the
soaring granite walls of 13,000-foot peaks. But we inevitably hiked past
countless, pretty lakes that presented alluring campsites.
Two of the most memorable were Island Lake,
where we stopped for lunch en route to Titcomb, and Peak Lake, which nestles in
a tiny bowl below peaks that resemble incisors, and which we reached after hiking
cross-country from Titcomb over Knapsack Col and down a lonely valley to reach
the Shannon Pass Trail. On a trip where a shocking number of lakes feel like one
of the prettiest spots on the planet, these two have burned lasting images in memory.
See my story about that trip, “Best of the Wind River Range: Backpacking to Titcomb Basin.”
I can help you plan this or any other trip you read about at my blog. Find out more here.
Imogene Lake, Sawtooth Wilderness, ID
Returning to Imogene Lake again for the first time in some years, on a weekend backpacking trip with my then-11-year-old daughter, I was reminded just how gorgeous this sprawling water body is. On calm days—like we had on this recent visit—the water reflects an Impressionist painting-like panorama of pine forest and rocky peaks.
I was actually planning to finally atone for my sin of having hiked past Imogene on at least two or three previous occasions by setting up camp here with my daughter. But we got a late start on a Friday and rolled in to Hell Roaring Lake—four miles below Imogene—after dark. So we just dayhiked to Imogene. I’ll camp there yet—I swear. Meanwhile, Hell Roaring is a pretty nice spot, too, and close enough to visit Imogene on a morning hike.
See my story “Jewels of the Sawtooths: Backpacking to Alice, Hell Roaring, and Imogene Lakes,” about father-son and father-daughter backpacking trips in Idaho’s Sawtooths, and all of my stories about the Sawtooths, including stories about backpacking in the remote southern Sawtooth Wilderness and “The Best Hikes and Backpacking Trips in Idaho’s Sawtooths.”
Elizabeth Lake, Glacier National Park, MT
I first included Elizabeth Lake on this list after
backpacking Glacier’s magnificent Northern Loop, which I describe how to plan
and hike in my e-guide “The
Best Backpacking Trip in Glacier National Park.” But more recently, I
returned to Glacier to make a comparably awe-inspiring, 90-mile, north-south
traverse of the park, mostly following the Continental Divide Trail, but with
some variations I built into the route to show friends who accompanied me what
I consider some the finest scenery in Glacier (described in this
e-guide).
And on our first night of that more-recent trip, we camped
at Elizabeth Lake—and I got the photo above early the next morning, as the calm,
chill air turned the lake into a mirror reflecting the surrounding, jagged
peaks. So technically, I’ve now hiked past Elizabeth and camped there, but
I decided it still belongs on this list so that you don’t risk passing up a
chance to spend a night there.
See my stories about backpacking Glacier’s Northern Loop and Gunsight Pass Trail and about traversing the park mostly following the Continental Divide Trail.
That hike through Glacier is one of “America’s Top 10 Best Backpacking Trips.”
By the Colorado River at Hance Rapids, Grand Canyon, AZ
While I have camped on the beach at Hance Rapids on the
Colorado River (it’s on my top
25 best backcountry campsites list), more recently, I backpacked
past that beach on a six-day trip that I concluded—after several trips in the
Big Ditch—is “the
best backpacking trip in the Grand Canyon.” As we left that beach, we
walked past a spacious (and empty!) campsite fully enclosed by trees that cast substantial
shade.
Anyone who’s hiked in the canyon understands the value of
shade—especially in a campsite. We had many miles to go that day, so we didn’t
stop. But the beach at Hance Rapids on the Colorado River has long been on my
radar (since I took this
three-day hike) as a spot to plan spending a night when hiking through this
corner of the canyon. This shady site will be the first place I check for
occupants the next time I plan to bed down on that beach.
See my story “The
Best Backpacking Trip in the Grand Canyon,” which includes a potential
night at Hance Rapids.
Get my expert e-guides to “The Best Backpacking Trip in the Grand Canyon,” and an alternative friendlier to first-timers there, “The Best First Backpacking Trip in the Grand Canyon.”
Marie Lake, John Muir Trail, CA
It was the fourth morning of our seven-day thru-hike of the John Muir Trail through California’s High Sierra, from Yosemite National Park to Mount Whitney. Three friends and I were climbing toward Selden Pass in the John Muir Wilderness and not even thinking about taking a break yet; we wouldn’t stop for the night until hours later.
Below us, Marie Lake lay still in a bowl of granite ledges with trees dotting the landscape, rocky islands in the lake, and an infinite selection of places around the lake to temporarily call home.
This was one of the most painful times I’ve hiked past a beautiful backcountry camp.
See my story “Thru-Hiking the John Muir Trail in 7 Days: Amazing Experience, or Certifiably Insane?” for more photos, a video, and detailed trip-planning information.
Want my help planning your JMT thru-hike?
I’ve helped many readers plan all the details of this classic trip, including getting a very hard-to-get permit, figuring out how many days to take, and finding the best campsites. See my Custom Trip Planning page to learn how I can help you.
Get the right shelter for trips like the JMT. See my picks for “The 9 (Very) Best Backpacking Tents”
and my expert tips in “How to Choose the Best Ultralight Backpacking Tent for You.”
Pyramid Lake, Wind River Range
It sure seems like I keep walking past really nice campsites in the Winds—maybe I just need to spend more time there. On a recent trip in early August with my son, we backpacked north from Big Sandy, intending to complete a four-day loop crossing the Continental Divide twice and finishing through the Cirque of the Towers. Unfortunately, the weather was so bad—almost continuous rain and virtually no views of the mountains, with no sign it would improve—that we decided against crossing any passes and bailed a day early.
But we did hike from one camp up to visit Pyramid Lake and saw enough of it to know I want to return. At nearly 10,600 feet at the end of the Pyramid Lake Trail, the lake nestles in a rocky basin at the foot of 11,978-foot Pyramid Peak, 12,454-foot Mount Hooker, and 12,185-foot Tower Peak (and a short, cross-country hike from the valley of the East Fork River on the Wind River High Route, which I write about further down in this story).
See all stories about backpacking in the Wind River Range at The Big Outside.
Grand Canyon of the Tuolumne River, Yosemite National Park, CA
On day three of a four-day, 87-mile, backpacking trip in the remote, northern reaches of Yosemite with my friend Todd, we reached one of that trek’s scenic highlights: the Grand Canyon of the Tuolumne River. With granite walls soaring hundreds of feet above a crystal-clear river that tumbles over innumerable waterfalls, massive boulders, and a beautiful bed of cobblestones, the canyon bears a striking resemblance to the park’s iconic feature, Yosemite Valley—except that it’s twice as long and has no roads or buildings and few people.
Todd and I actually spent a pleasant night in the Grand Canyon of the Tuolumne, initially sleeping under the stars on a big granite slab by the river, then quickly pitching our tarp in the woods when rain started falling after dark. But we didn’t score one of the several primo campsites we saw in the canyon, either because we walked past them before we were ready to stop for the night, or someone else already occupied them. To grab one of the campsites that sit near any of the waterfalls and great swimming holes, I suggest trying to reach the mid-canyon stretch by early afternoon, before most other backpackers.
See many more images, a video, and trip-planning trips in my story about that backpacking trip in northern Yosemite, “Best of Yosemite, Part 2: Backpacking Remote Northern Yosemite,” and all of my stories about Yosemite at The Big Outside, including “Best of Yosemite, Part 1: Backpacking South of Tuolumne Meadows,” about a 65-mile hike south of Tuolumne.
Plan your next great backpacking adventure in Yosemite and other flagship parks using my expert e-guides.
Bench Lakes, Sawtooth Wilderness, ID
As we hiked past the second-highest of a string of five lakes that sit above 8,000 feet on the east side of the Sawtooths, the glassy waters of a calm early morning offered a perfect reflection of the incisor summit ridge of Mount Heyburn high above us. It was early on a long day my friend Chip Roser and I would spend climbing Heyburn, and would ultimately be one of the day’s finest moments. A rough, sometimes-obscure use trail leads to the Bench Lakes from Trail 101 above Redfish Lake. The highest of the Bench Lakes, at over 8,600 feet, is the most alpine of them and has campsites right at the foot of Heyburn.
See all of my stories about the Sawtooths, including my stories “The Best of Idaho’s Sawtooths: Backpacking Redfish to Pettit,” “Photo Gallery: Mountain Lakes of Idaho’s Sawtooths,” and “The Best Hikes and Backpacking Trips in Idaho’s Sawtooths.”
I’ve helped many readers plan an unforgettable backpacking trip in the Sawtooths.
Want my help with yours? Find out more here.
Jacob Hamblin Arch, Coyote Gulch, UT
I had fully intended for our group of two families to spend
our second night backpacking Coyote Gulch right beneath Jacob Hamblin Arch; I
remembered, from a trip there years earlier, that it’s a magical spot to
layover and watch the light shift.
But when our group reached Coyote Natural Bridge that
afternoon, the kids were ready to call it a day; and it being about an hour (at
a family pace) downstream from Jacob Hamblin, and not a bad place at all to
pitch tents on the broad, sandy beach below the bridge (it was formerly on my top
25 best backcountry campsites list), I quickly gave up
on the idea of reaching the arch. I also knew the arch is a popular spot, so all
available sites could be snapped up by the time we got there. It turned out
they weren’t, and a prime campsite, on the upstream side looking right up at
the arch, was actually empty when we got there the next morning. Oh, well.
See my
story about backpacking Coyote Gulch and
dayhiking slot canyons and trails in Grand Staircase-Escalante National
Monument and neighboring Bryce Canyon and Capitol Reef national parks for more
photos, videos, and detailed trip-planning information.
After Coyote Gulch, hike the rest of “The 10 Best Backpacking Trips in the Southwest.”
Toltec Beach, Royal Arch Loop, Grand Canyon, AZ
As with the Tetons, there’s not likely a bad campsite in the GC—or at least none that I’ve found. But when three friends and I reached Toltec Beach, beside the Colorado River on the Grand Canyon’s very rugged, 34.5-mile Royal Arch Loop, around lunchtime on our second day, we all made a vow to return there. The river offered an area to cool ourselves in the water, there was a tree casting nice shade onto the sand, and the views, of course, were epic.
The Royal Arch Loop makes a top-to-bottom-and-back-up circuit of
the canyon—going from a words-can’t-do-it-justice panorama at
the rim to dipping your toes in the Colorado. It delivers a highlights reel of just
about every type of physical feature that makes backpacking in the Grand Canyon
unique: sweeping views, an intimate side canyon with lush hanging gardens nurtured
by a vibrant stream, a high solitude quotient, and one drop-dead gorgeous
campsite after another.
See my story about that trip “Not
Quite Impassable: Backpacking the Grand Canyon’s Royal Arch Loop.”
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Snowdrift Lake, Grand Teton National Park, WY
I’ve had the pleasure of gazing upon the emerald waters of this alpine lake four times now—and I actually did once pitch a tent on a slope above the lake, but never in the site at the lake’s eastern end. A long, oval, often wind-battered gem parked at the head of Avalanche Canyon, just a few hundred feet below 10,680-foot Avalanche Divide and the long cliff band named The Wall, Snowdrift is not reached by any official park trail.
But there is an unofficial, unmarked, rough, and strenuous user trail that climbs up Avalanche Canyon; it branches west off the Valley Trail just north of Taggart Lake. It’s a hard trail to carry a pack up, and not much easier to carry a pack down (and finding the easy, safe way through the cliffs below Snowdrift Lake is trickier going downhill than uphill; I’ve done it in both directions). The easiest access to Snowdrift is hiking the good trail from South Fork Cascade Canyon up to Avalanche Divide, then hiking cross-country, over easy terrain, down to the east end of Snowdrift. The campsite is exposed, so don’t go if it’s windy or in bad weather.
See all of my stories about Grand Teton National Park, including this story that describes how to hike to Snowdrift Lake in Avalanche Canyon.
Dying to backpack in the Tetons? See my e-guides to the Teton Crest Trail and
the best short backpacking trip there.
Phelps Basin and Spider Gap route, Glacier Peak Wilderness, WA
On the first afternoon of a spectacular, five-day family hike of the Spider Gap-Buck Creek Pass Loop through Washington’s Glacier Peak Wilderness—among my favorite wild lands—we camped in a spacious, established site in the woods above Spider Meadow and minutes below Phelps Basin. Two other parties had already grabbed the available sites in Phelps Basin (photo above), as I discovered, to my dismay, when we took an evening stroll up there.
The next morning, we carried our packs up the trail to Spider Gap, passing more campers perched on the bench atop a steep wall of earth high above Spider Meadow (photo at right). Whenever I get back there again, it will be exceedingly difficult to choose between these two spots.
See my story, with lots of images, about our five-day, family-backpacking trip in Washington’s Glacier Peak Wilderness.
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Arrowhead Lake, Sawtooth Wilderness, ID
Since my first of now many trips into Idaho’s Sawtooths, I’ve often marveled at how these toothy, granite peaks remind me of the High Sierra—without the crowds of hikers found in parts of the Sierra. My friend Jeff Wilhelm and I hiked past Arrowhead Lake on the second morning of a four-day trip and immediately agreed we needed to return with fishing poles and stay longer. I snapped this photo when Jeff walked out onto the granite spit jutting into the lake.
See my story about that backpacking in the remote southern Sawtooth Wilderness and my story “The Best Hikes and Backpacking Trips in Idaho’s Sawtooths.”
Which puffy should you buy? See my review of “The 10 Best Down Jackets” and
“How You Can Tell How Warm a Down Jacket Is.”
The Wind River High Route, WY
When three friends and I set out on a seven-day, 96-mile traverse of the Wind River High Route—65 miles of which is off-trail, including nine of 10 named alpine passes between roughly 11,000 and 13,000 feet—we expected to be dazzled by one of the very best wilderness treks any of us had ever taken. And it exceeded expectations.
Inevitably, we hiked past many spots we’d love to have set up camp for the night. But two spots, in particular, stood out for me. One was in the valley of the East Fork River, where we hiked below a long chain of towering cliffs and soaked in frigid pools between cascades that tumbled over granite slabs in the shallow river. The second spot was in the long valley of the Alpine Lakes—one of the most starkly beautiful places I’ve ever seen. High above one of those lakes, we crossed a wide, grassy shelf sprinkled with rocks that looked like a little piece of the Scottish Highlands transported to the Wyoming mountains. It pained me to not stop there.
Read my story about that trip, “Adventure and Adversity on the Wind River High Route.”
Hance Creek, Grand Canyon, AZ
This is a
success story. The camping area on Hance Creek, on the east side of Horseshoe
Mesa, earned a spot on this list when I backpacked past it with my then-10-year-old
daughter on this
three-day hike. That’s my justification for keeping it
on this list—even though I’m happy to report that I’ve since returned and spent
a night there (photo above) on a six-day trip that I’ve described as “the
best backpacking trip in the Grand Canyon.”
Not to be confused with the beach at Hance Rapids on the Colorado
River—which is several trail miles from and a couple thousand feet below the
camping area at Hance Creek—the camping zone at Hance Creek is flanked by sheer, vibrantly red
walls that by late afternoon cast a long, blessed shadow to give us relief from
the sun.
See my story “The Best Backpacking Trip in the Grand Canyon,” which includes a potential night at Hance Rapids.
Click here now for my expert e-guide to the best backpacking trip in the Grand Canyon.
Upper Boulder Chain Lakes, White Cloud Mountains, ID
On a 28-mile, one-day loop hike through the heart of one of the most scenic Western mountain ranges that most hikers have never heard of, Idaho’s White Clouds, two friends and I scrambled off-trail up a very steep headwall, passed through a notch in a row of pinnacles, then picked up a trail and descended into the valley of a string of pearls known as the Boulder Chain Lakes. While we would run into backpackers camped at the lower lakes, we saw no one at three of the highest and most remote of the chain, Headwall Lake, Scoop Lake, and Hummock Lake, perched amid copses of conifers beneath peaks of unbelievably white rock that give these mountains their name.
Read my story about a 28-mile dayhike through Idaho’s White Cloud Mountains, with more photos and trip-planning info.
That White Clouds dayhike is featured in my story “Extreme Hiking: America’s Best Hard Dayhikes.”
Whether you’re a beginner or seasoned backpacker, you’ll learn new tricks for making all of your trips go better in my “12 Expert Tips for Planning a Wilderness Backpacking Trip” and “A Practical Guide to Lightweight and Ultralight Backpacking.” If you don’t have a paid subscription to The Big Outside, you can read part of both stories for free, or download the e-guide versions of “12 Expert Tips for Planning a Wilderness Backpacking Trip” and the lightweight backpacking guide without having a paid membership.
