By Michael Lanza
America’s most stunning landscapes are protected within our 63 national parks, and some of the very finest scenery within our national heritage can be reached on dayhikes. Some of these hikes you may not have done yet or heard of. Others are famous, but there’s a reason for that: They are mind-blowingly gorgeous, so they stand out even in parks with multiple, five-star footpaths. You take these hikes for a one-of-a-kind experience.
Based on more than three decades of exploring most major U.S. national parks—many of those years as a field editor for Backpacker magazine and running this blog—including numerous trips to popular parks like Yosemite, Yellowstone, Grand Canyon, Glacier, Grand Teton, Zion, and others, I’ve assembled this list of the 25 best dayhikes in our parks. Many can be done by novice hikers and kids (and my kids have done many of them), while others are burlier adventures.
While you don’t usually set out on some these hikes expecting solitude, you can find it by doing them early or late in the day or outside of peak season; I offer tips below on the best times to do some of these hikes.
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Use this as your tick list of great national park dayhikes to knock off, and I guarantee you’ll experience the best miles of trail our National Park System has to offer.
If I’ve missed an outstanding, favorite hike of yours, please suggest it in the comments section below to give me ideas for future trips. I regularly update and expand this list whenever I knock off a new trail that belongs here, and I try to respond to all comments.
Table of Contents
South Kaibab Trail, Grand Canyon
You can’t go wrong on any dayhike in the Grand Canyon, but the South Kaibab is widely considered the premier trail in the Big Ditch. Following the crest of a narrow ridge that descends all the way to the Colorado River, it delivers expansive canyon views beginning within minutes of the trailhead.
It’s seven miles and 4,780 vertical feet one-way from the South Rim to the Colorado River—a one-day round-trip appropriate only for extremely fit hikers with desert-hiking experience, who are carrying enough food and water for a big day (there’s no water along the trail). But you can turn back at any point, choosing the length and difficulty of your hike—keeping in mind that going back up requires much more time and effort than going down. Start at first light and you’ll not only share the trail with far fewer people, you’ll be looking out over the Grand Canyon as the prettiest light of the day spills across it.
See all of my stories about the Grand Canyon’s South Kaibab Trail and all of my stories about the Grand Canyon at The Big Outside.
Click here now for my expert e-guide to hiking the Grand Canyon rim to rim!
Upper Yosemite Falls, Yosemite
Besides its towering granite walls, Yosemite Valley is famous for waterfalls that plummet hundreds and thousands of feet. The tallest, Upper Yosemite Falls, drops a sheer 1,400 feet (2,425 feet including the middle cascades and Lower Yosemite Falls, making the total drop the world’s sixth tallest). At its brink, you’ll traverse a catwalk chiseled out of a granite wall to a ledge (with a safety rail) where you can peer down at the freefalling water and out over Yosemite Valley, nearly 3,000 feet below.
The round-trip hike to the top of Upper Yosemite Falls is 7.2 miles and 2,700 feet, but you can turn back at any point, such as at Columbia Rock (a mile and 1,000 feet uphill from the trailhead), which has a broad view of Yosemite Valley; or a half-mile farther, near the base of the upper falls, where you can stand in the rain of its intense mist.
See my stories “The 10 Best Dayhikes in Yosemite” and “The Magic of Hiking to Yosemite’s Waterfalls,” and all of my stories about Yosemite.
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Highline Trail, Glacier
From 6,646-foot Logan Pass, the high point on Glacier’s Going-to-the-Sun Road, the Highline Trail traverses north across rolling, alpine terrain above treeline, with uninterrupted views of the park’s jagged peaks and soaring cliffs. It’s common to see bighorn sheep and mountain goats along the trail, and occasionally sight a black bear or even a grizzly (bring binoculars).
Hike in daylight as a bear-safety precaution, but start early morning, before most hikers, for the best chances of seeing wildlife. Distance options include turning around at any point or hiking 11.8 miles to The Loop on the Going-to-the-Sun Road, which, like Logan Pass, is a stop on the park’s free shuttle bus. Or hike the 7.6 miles from Logan Pass to Granite Park, spend the night at the Granite Park Chalet (make a reservation months in advance); and the next day, either backtrack to Logan Pass or continue over Swiftcurrent Pass and descend to Many Glacier, another 7.6-mile day.
See “The 6 Best Long Hikes in Glacier National Park” and all of my stories about the Highline Trail and Glacier National Park at The Big Outside.
Get my expert e-guides to the best backpacking trip in Glacier
and backpacking the Continental Divide Trail through Glacier.
Angels Landing and West Rim Trail, Zion
The 2.5-mile, 1,500-foot (one-way) ascent of Angels Landing culminates in one of the airiest and most thrilling half-mile stretches (actually, 0.4 mile) of trail in the entire National Park System: You scale a steep ridge crest of solid rock, on a path at times just a few feet wide, with steps carved out of sandstone and chain handrails in spots (see lead photo at top of story). Listed on the National Register of Historic Places, Angels Landing really has no peers.
Two tips: If you can hike a strong pace, start early morning or late afternoon to avoid the crowds and the heat of midday. And after summiting Angels, continue up the West Rim Trail for another mile or two; you’ll not only lose the crowds, you will enjoy increasingly dramatic views of Zion Canyon and venture into a quieter, sublimely beautiful area of giant beehive towers and white walls streaked in red and orange. The trail eventually climbs through exposed switchbacks to the West Rim, roughly five miles and 2,000 feet from The Grotto Trailhead where the hike begins.
Due to the enormous popularity of Angels Landing, Zion National Park is launching on April 1, 2022, a permit system for dayhiking Angels. Find out more at nps.gov/zion/planyourvisit/angels-landing-hiking-permits.htm.
See my stories “Hiking Angels Landing: What You Need to Know,” “Insider Tips: The 10 Best Hikes in Zion National Park,” “The 12 Best Hikes in Utah’s National Parks,” and all of my stories about Zion at The Big Outside.
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North Rim Trail, Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone River, Yellowstone
With more than 10,000 geothermal features, including hot springs, mud pots, fumaroles, and at least 300 geysers—two-thirds of the planet’s known geysers—Yellowstone is a land of marvels. Plus, you have a virtual guarantee of seeing more bison and elk than you can count and possibly other wildlife like wolves, bald eagles, trumpeter swans, and grizzly and black bears.
But of all the trails in the park, I’ll submit the North Rim Trail, hundreds of feet above the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone River, as the most spectacular. Traversing the rim for 3.2 miles from Inspiration Point to the overlook of 109-foot Upper Yellowstone Falls, the trail passes several dramatic overlooks of the canyon’s crumbling, golden walls. Don’t pass up the side trip down the steep switchbacks of the half-mile-long Brink of the Lower Falls Trail, which, as advertised, leads to the very lip of 308-foot Lower Yellowstone Falls.
See all of my stories about Yellowstone, including “The Ultimate Family Tour of Yellowstone,” and “The 10 Best Hikes in Yellowstone,” which includes the North Rim Trail.
Want more? See “America’s Top 10 Best Backpacking Trips”
and “Extreme Hiking: America’s Best Hard Dayhikes.”
Cascade Pass and Sahale Arm, North Cascades
North Cascades is one of the wildest, most rugged and spectacular, and least-visited parks—and after several trips, one of my favorites. With 9,000 feet of severe relief between the highest, jagged summits and deepest, rainforest valleys, more than 300 glaciers, and year-round snow coverage, the range has earned the nickname the “American Alps.”
But with 93 percent of its nearly 700,000 acres designated as wilderness, much of this park can only be seen by people willing to hike long distances over multiple days. Lucky for dayhikers, the 7.4-mile, 1,800-foot round-trip hike to Cascade Pass delivers views usually reserved for backpackers and climbers. Continue past it up wildflower-strewn Sahale Arm for steadily expanding views of a sea of pinnacles, ice, and snow. It’s another 4.4 miles and 2,300 feet to the trail’s end at Sahale Glacier Camp, but turn around at any time.
See my story “Exploring the ‘American Alps:’ The North Cascades,” and all of my stories about the North Cascades region at The Big Outside.
See Sahale Glacier Camp in North Cascades in my story “Tent Flap With a View: 25 Favorite Backcountry Campsites.”
Garnet Canyon, Grand Teton
The Tetons are another mountain range where some of the best views are enjoyed only by hiking many miles or tying into a rope. But Garnet Canyon, where soaring granite walls form a horseshoe beneath the Grand, Middle, and South Tetons and neighboring peaks, offers arguably the best views in the park that you can reach on a moderate dayhike.
From the Lupine Meadows Trailhead, it’s about four-and-a-half miles with more than 2,200 feet of vertical to the grassy area known as The Meadows, where there are campsites by a creek. The last stretch to The Meadows crosses an area of massive boulders beyond the end of the maintained Garnet Canyon Trail, but the views are just as good before the boulders.
Hiking to Amphitheater Lake, ringed by cliffs and forest high on Disappointment Peak and reached by a trail that forks off the path to Garnet Canyon, adds four miles out-and-back.
See my stories “Great Hike: Garnet Canyon, Grand Teton National Park” and “10 Great Big Dayhikes in the Tetons,” and all of my stories about Grand Teton National Park.
Dying to backpack in the Tetons? See my e-guides to the Teton Crest Trail and
the best short backpacking trip there.
Navajo-Queens Garden and Peek-a-Boo Loops, Bryce Canyon
Descend into Bryce Canyon on the Navajo Loop/Queens Garden Loop and you’ll walk through a maze of the multi-colored, limestone, sandstone, and mudstone spires called “hoodoos,” which resemble giant, melting candles, including one of the park’s best-known formations, Thor’s Hammer. But continue beyond that popular and short hike onto the Peek-a-Boo Loop, and you will lose the crowds—and discover the scenic heart of Bryce Canyon, hiking below row after row of towers in shades of flourescent red and orange, like the aptly named Wall of Windows.
The hike, mostly on good trails that are easy to follow, weaves among tall hoodoos, passes through doorways blasted through walls of rock, and wraps through amphitheaters of wildly colored, slender spires—a delightful, half-day hike that constantly changes character. The six-mile loop, with a cumulative elevation gain and loss of about 1,600 feet, begins and ends at Sunset Point.
See “The Best Hike in Bryce Canyon National Park,” and all of my stories about Utah national parks at The Big Outside.
I can help you plan the best backpacking, hiking, or family adventure of your life. Click here.
Half Dome, Yosemite
One of America’s most iconic and sought-after hikes, the trek to Half Dome’s 8,800-foot summit—a tough 16 miles round-trip from Happy Isles Trailhead in Yosemite Valley, with 4,800 feet of elevation gain and loss—reaches its literal and emotional apex at the several hundred vertical feet of cables the park installs on the steep slab leading to the vast summit plateau. At the top, many hikers venture to the ledge known as The Visor that overhangs Half Dome’s famous Northwest Face, posing for photos on that granite gangplank thousands of feet above Yosemite Valley. Nothing compares with this hike.
Ascend the steeper Mist Trail past 317-foot Vernal Fall and 594-foot
Nevada Fall, and after climbing Half Dome, descend the John Muir Trail—which
has a classic view back toward Nevada Fall, the granite dome Liberty Cap, and
the back side of Half Dome. Tip: Start an hour before sunrise to get ahead of most other
hikers on this popular route.
See my “Hiking Half Dome: How to Do It Right and Get a Permit,” which includes information about obtaining a coveted permit to dayhike it, and my stories “The 10 Best Dayhikes in Yosemite” and “The Magic of Hiking to Yosemite’s Waterfalls” for details on hiking the much shorter and easier, classic loop of the Mist Trail and John Muir Trail to Vernal and Nevada Falls.
Want to backpack in Yosemite? See my e-guides to three amazing multi-day hikes there.
Clingmans Dome and Appalachian Trail, Great Smoky Mountains
Set aside the fact that over 12 million people annually visit the Great Smokies—America’s most popular park—and thousands hike the half-mile-long, paved walkway to the observation tower atop 6,643-foot Clingmans Dome, the park’s highest point. Still, the 360-degree panorama of the overlapping, forested ridges of the Southern Appalachians will steal your breath away (if the steep hike up didn’t).
Then head west on the Appalachian Trail—the 2.2 miles one-way to the Goshen Prong Trail junction is far enough—for a much quieter experience of walking the rocky, up-and-down crest of one of the East’s tallest mountain ranges, passing numerous overlooks of the rugged peaks and valleys on the North Carolina and Tennessee sides of the park. Double back to the Clingmans Dome parking lot and hike 3.6-mile out-and-back (for a total distance of nine miles) on the Forney Ridge Trail to 5,920-foot Andrews Bald, the highest grassy bald in the Smokies, where the views span a broad expanse of North Carolina’s mountains; azalea and rhododendron bloom spectacularly from mid-June to early July.
See more photos and info in my story “In the Garden of Eden: Backpacking the Great Smoky Mountains,” about a trip that included Clingmans Dome, the Appalachian Trail, and Andrews Bald, and see all of my stories about hiking and backpacking in the North Carolina mountains.
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The Narrows, Zion
From
the Temple of Sinawava at the upper end of Zion Canyon (reached on the park’s
free shuttle bus), the flat, 1.1-mile Riverside Walk passes below shady cottonwood
trees and soaring, blood-red cliffs along the North Fork of the Virgin
River. Where that trail
ends, you step into the shallow river and head upstream into an environment
unlike anything most hikers ever experience: The Narrows, a canyon with sheer
walls shooting up to a thousand feet overhead and, in places, so close that
they turn daylight to dusk.
Hiking much of the time in the typically cold river, you
will gaze up at a canyon that changes with every bend. At 2.5 miles from the trailhead,
you enter the roughly two-mile-long stretch known as Wall Street, where
the river often spans the canyon wall to wall. At five miles—the farthest
hikers are permitted to go without a permit—you reach Big Spring, a waterfall gushing from
solid rock, nurturing a hanging garden in the desert.
See my stories “Insider Tips: The 10 Best Hikes in Zion National Park,” which includes expert advice on preparing for a Narrows dayhike and avoiding the crowds, and “Luck of the Draw, Part 2: Backpacking Zion’s Narrows.”
Click here now to get my expert e-guide to backpacking Zion’s Narrows.
Third Beach to Strawberry Point, Olympic
Stone pinnacles called sea stacks rise up to some 200 feet out of the pounding Pacific Ocean. Sea otters, seals, and whales swim offshore and bald eagles fly overhead. Mussels, sea stars, and sea anemones carpet boulders in tide pools. In one of Earth’s largest virgin temperate rainforests, Sitka spruce and western red cedar grow to 150 feet tall, with diameters of 10 or 15 feet, and Douglas fir and western hemlock soar well over 200 feet.
The 73 miles of coast in Olympic National Park comprise the longest strip of wilderness seashore in the contiguous United States, remote and mostly accessible only to backpackers. But dayhikers can sample it on the relatively flat, 10-mile, out-and-back dayhike from Third Beach Trailhead on La Push Road to Strawberry Point, one of the spots with a cluster of offshore sea stacks. Up for 14 miles round-trip? Continue to Toleak Point, where at low tide you can scramble out onto some sea stacks.
See my story “The Wildest Shore: Backpacking the Southern Olympic Coast,” and all of my stories about Olympic National Park at The Big Outside.
The Pacific Northwest is a wet place. See “The 5 Best Rain Jackets for Hiking and Backpacking.”
Delicate Arch at Sunset, Arches
Just three miles out-and-back with less than 500 feet of elevation gain, the well-traveled path to what is probably Utah’s most famous and most-photographed natural arch is best done in the evening, timing your arrival at Delicate Arch for before sunset. Although still popular as a sunset hike, it’s more pleasant than trudging it during the heat of the day, and the sunset light seems to electrify the sandstone’s burnt color.
One of the pleasures of the hike is how the final stretch of the trail traverses the side of a small slickrock cliff before suddenly popping you out on the rim of an amphitheater of solid rock, looking across the big bowl at Delicate Arch, with the La Sal Mountains, snow-covered in spring, visible through its keyhole. Tip: Bring a headlamp and jacket and linger until well after sunset, when most other hikers have already started back, and you’ll enjoy a quieter walk under a sky riddled with stars.
See my story “No Straight Lines: Backpacking and Hiking in Canyonlands and Arches National Parks,” and all of my stories about Arches National Park.
Score a popular permit using my “10 Tips For Getting a Hard-to-Get National Park Backcountry Permit.”
Are you also a backpacker? You may like my stories “The 10 Best National Park Backpacking Trips” and “12 Expert Tips for Planning a Wilderness Backpacking Trip.”
See a menu of all stories about national park adventures at The Big Outside.
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