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El Caminito del Rey (The King’s Pathway), El Chorro, Spain

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We’ve cOmbiNeD some of our favorite hikes from all around world into the untimate top 10 list. You’ll find everything from hiking an active volcano (or two), to walking across the top of the rainforest. We’ll take you from walking on the top of the world to below it, and everywhere in between. So kick back, grab a cold one and dive in as we walk and occasionally balance our way through some of the most extreme hikes in the world.

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Devil’s Path Catskill Forest Preserve, New York

Best for: Hikers looking for an East Coast challenge that bags several peaks in one tough day trip and requires strong nerves and legs Distance: 23.6 miles

This hike is a true roller coaster, heading straight up and straight down seven summits and racking up a ridiculous 18,000 feet of elevation gain (with lots of loss in between). The Devil’s Path takes the straightest line possible, which means instead of switchbacks hikers need to navigate loose rock, vertical scrambles, and sheer drops. Often, roots serve as emergency handholds or hikers need to wedge themselves up small chimneys. All that scrambling and vertical adds up to give the trail a reputation as the toughest hike on the East Coast. It very well may be, if you try to tackle it all in one day (there are options to backpack or break it down into smaller east and west sections, or just hike the peaks individually).

There is salvation here, too. Six of the path’s seven summits count for the Catskill 3500 Club (membership requires you to climb the 35 peaks over 3,500 feet in the range). The views once you do reach the summits will make you forget you are just three hours from downtown Manhattan as dreamy expanses of deciduous green roll off to the horizon. The native Lenape named this place Onteora, or “The Land in the Sky.” Sure, these peaks may not be the stark rock outcrops of the Rockies, but they don’t give up their summits easily.

Thrill Factor: You may hear a lot of hype about the dangers of Devil’s Path, but it basically amounts to a very challenging hike that can be extremely precarious if the rock is wet, or worse, icy. Be careful—you won’t need your rock climbing shoes, but sticky approach shoes will help.

10 Dry Fork Coyote Gulch Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument, Utah Best for: Slot canyon exploration and play for everyone from daring canyoneers to kids Distance: About 3.5 miles round-trip

Welcome to nature’s amusement park. A short hike down into the sandstone canyon walls of Dry Fork—located off the Hole-in-the-Rock road where Mormon pioneers first found a route through this severe, distant corner of the Colorado Plateau—is all it takes to reach some of the most intriguing and easiest to enjoy slot canyons in Utah. Dry Gulch is a wonder in itself. Its rock walls formed from ancient sand dunes long buried and turned to stone before tectonic uplift sent them back aboveground to be carved out by eons of flash flood erosion and wind scouring. But it’s the side slots just a short way upstream that make this place such a draw for visitors to the Grand Staircase-Escalante, and they are where the real fun begins.

The first of these side slots is called Peek-a-Boo because it consists of a series of big round windows and arches in the Navajo sandstone, with potholes, often filled deep with water, lurking in the floor below. It requires a bit of a scramble up carved stone steps to reach and some care to navigate, but it’s basically a fun romp. The next slot up Dry Gulch, Spooky, is the real stand-out. It’s a perfect, narrow crack that’s consistently 30 feet deep and no wider than 18 inches across for over a half a mile. It’s so tight some adults may not fit (and in many spots it pinches down to less than ten inches across, so they will definitely have to suck in their bellies and turn sideways)—but children will find it easier to move up the wafer-thin slot faster than their parents. The last and least visited slot, Brimstone, is dark and gloomy, even deeper than Spooky, and narrowing so much at points that hikers need to make their way far up above the sandy floor.

Thrill Factor: It’s an ideal natural playground for anyone except extremely claustrophobic and larger-than-average people. Brimstone is the only truly dangerous one of the slots—local legend has it that one hiker got wedged in and stuck for days. But as long as you are careful and cognizant of the dan-gers of hiking in the desert.

9 Búri Cave Thorlákshöfn, Iceland

Best for: Hikers who like a tight squeeze and experiencing the underworld Distance: 1.3 miles round-trip, plus hike to cave

Welcome to our “Tunnel of Love” hike. While there are hundreds of thrilling, frightening, and wondrous lava caves in the lava fields of this active volcanic island, Búri is one of the most eerily beautiful, as well as one of the latest to be discovered. It was only first explored in 2005 and was soon heralded as one of Iceland’s most remarkable lava caves. But it’s not for everyone. To reach it requires a short hike across the Leitahraun lava fields, the remnants of lava that flowed and cooled from the Leiti volcano all the way to the sea in some spots. Lava tubes formed here about 5,000 years ago when parts of that magma cooled faster than others, forming the cave walls, while the hot lava flowed through, forming the long, smooth caves themselves. Leitahraun is a Swiss cheese of these tubes, including the 4,462-foot-long Raufarholshellir tube and cathedral-like Arnarker cave.

Named after the first of the Aesir gods who is said to have been born when a primordial giant’s cow licked the salty ice that existed before the Earth, Búri is covered in ice for its first section, making it feel like the mythical cow’s salt lick, and filled with odd, dripping sculptures that shimmer phantasmagorically in the light of headlamps. After the ice, it runs through a long, 30-foot-high, 30-foot-wide tube of lava rock that feels like an abandoned subway tunnel, before ending a 55-foot-high lava pit at the end. Emerging again into the sunlight feels like being reborn.

Thrill Factor: Don’t go if you are afraid of the dark or claustrophobic. The tunnel is not necessarily dangerous but anyone exploring it should have caving experience, a light (and a backup light), and a helmet. It’s best to go on a guided trip, many of which pick up clients directly at their hotels in Reykjavik.

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Kakum Canopy Walk Kakum National Park, Ghana

Best for: Observing one of the most biodiverse rain forests on the planet from the heights of the canopy Distance: 1,150 feet

Created by locals concerned about preserving the virgin beauty of Ghana’s dense biodiverse rain forest, Kakum National Park has been drawing more and more tourists from abroad ever since it was created in 1992. And those visitors come to catch a glimpse of some of the place’s rare wildlife. African forest elephants tramp through the underbrush. Civets and leopards hunt in the dark of night. Bongos and little duikers browse between the trees. The treetops of Kakum are home to colobus and endangered Roloway monkeys. And 200 species of birds and 550 species of butterflies flit through the high branches. The best way to check out this paradise? Take a hike in the sky.

Built in 1995 and the only hanging bridge of its type in Africa, the park’s canopy walk links seven giant trees through a series of floating nets and walkways dangling a hundred feet off the forest floor. The suspended path is just wide enough to walk with two feet. In the middle, you may feel like a denizen of the high canopy, lightly shaking side to side in the midst of the branches with the predators on the ground far below. You are not guaranteed to see wildlife on the walk (though if you are lucky and quiet you will), so if you want to get a guaranteed glimpse of the native fauna up close, head to the Monkey Forest Resort, a nearby private sanctuary. For the protection of the forest, canopy walkers need to be accompanied by a park guide—a good thing since these locals can teach much about the flora and fauna in their backyard, as well as what it takes to save them.

Thrill Factor: Unless you are afraid of heights, this is a fun way to immerse yourself in the rain forest.

5 Black Hole of White Canyon Hanksville, Utah

Best for: Swimmers Distance: 5 miles

The Black Hole is the flume of our thrill-ride hikes—a slot canyon that must be swum. It’s deep and dark and filled with cold water year-round, requir-ing a wetsuit even when temperatures are broiling far above. After a short hike, you plunge into the muddy stream and swim down (many spots are wadeable depending on the season) for two miles, peering up at the sheer sandstone walls towering hundreds of feet above. You can also check out the markers of the raw power of the Colorado Plateau’s flash floods in the canyon: Look up and you will see dead trees wedged in the slot as far as 50 feet above you, where torrential water once carried them. At times that debris has blocked the canyon, sometimes requiring ropes and a lot of forethought to navigate precariously piled logjams.

Those floods are an ever present danger in this peaceful spot—in the 1990s a teenage girl was swept to her death down here. But keep an eye on the weather, and you can simply bob downstream, relax, and enjoy the craftsmanship of the rushing water that carved out this enchanted canyon. Some canyoneers even bring a little inflatable ducky children’s pool toy along to use as a kickboard heading downstream.

Thrill Factor: You must be able and willing to swim and wear a wetsuit even in the summer (a short-sleeve one will work when it’s full summer). There are no real technical obstacles to navigate in the canyon, but it’s not a bad idea to have at least a small rope in case you don’t feel comfortable downclimbing. Also, floods can change things—in 2003, they created new technical obstacles that have since shifted away. Once you are in, you are fully committed—there’s no escape route—so analyze weather reports before you attempt it and be aware that storms far upstream cause flash floods.

7 Pacaya Pacaya Volcano National Park, Antigua, Guatemala

Best for: Hikers who want to feel the heat of an active volcano Distance: 3.2 miles round-trip

Looming in the skyline just 20 miles from the metropolis of Guatemala City, 8,373-foot Pacaya is one consistently moody volcano (it’s technically a complex volcano, a caldera with multiple vents within its summit crater circumference). It has been active for at least the last 23,000 years, consistently brooding with steam, spitting out lava in pyrotechnic strombolian eruptions (see Stromboli), and occasionally bursting out in more major events. The most recent of these big blasts have sent lava rivers rolling down the sides of the mountain in 2006 and covered the capital city in ash in 2010. And in early 2014 Pacaya started to get ornery again—exploding in ash and gas plumes and belching lava bombs and rocks while new craters flowed with lava.

So how about hiking up to get up close and personal with this beast? It’s not as dangerous as you might think, though of course your safety is not guaranteed when tempting the moods of a volcano. Several tour operators run trips up into the caldera, and some even let you camp out overnight, where you can perhaps watch fiery strombolian eruptions from your tent window and roast marshmallows over fumaroles or hot lava. It’s a quick and easy hike, but steep and at elevation so you may breathe heavy on the way up. You’ll certainly exhale once you get there and see rivers of molten magma at your feet.

Thrill Factor: The trail up is not necessarily scary, but you are playing around on an active volcano that last had a major eruption in 2013 and had a small paroxysm, or sudden eruption, in January 2014, so be aware of current volcanic monitoring (you can check on updates here) and be very careful inside the crater, especially around the hot spots and fumaroles. The payoff is you get to look at the workings inside an active crater, and it is one impressive show.

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Mount Huashan Huashan National Park, China

Best for: Pilgrims and daredevils Distance: 7.5 miles from the gate to the top of South Peak

The path along rickety planks hanging out over the void on China’s Mount Huashan have become a viral video sensation, showing up on “Craziest Hikes” lists everywhere. But that moniker is a bit of a misconception. The perilous, die-if-you-fall hike that looks like it was built by Spanky and the Little Rascals is just one small path on the massive Huashan, which is the westernmost of China’s Five Great Mountains (each of which is named for the cardinal directions and a center peak), ancient imperial pilgrimage sites sacred to Taoists and still drawing spiritual travelers and tourists to the temples perched on them. Huashan is not a single summit but a complex of five major peaks, the highest of which is the 7,087-foot South Peak. The Chang Kong Zhan Dao (or Sky Plank Road) is the boldest way access to the South Peak (which itself consists of three subpeaks). It’s a loony, fun ride of ladders, foot-wide wooden boards, cables, and steps hacked into the cliff—all hanging in the sky. You can rent via ferrata-type gear to protect yourself as you navigate it.

Ascending Huashan is a walk into the spiritual history of the mountain and China itself. For millennia the way up Huashan was supposed to be difficult, testing the pilgrim who wished to find the way (or the Tao). Each of the granitic peaks can be accessed by a different hike (and two of them by cable car) or by a new loop trail at the top.

Thrill Factor: The Chang Kong Zhan Dao is truly dangerous, even with safety gear. The rest of the mountain is accessed by thousands of tourists (a record 47,000 visited the site in one day in 2013) in varying states of fitness, so you should be able to reach the top even if you don’t want to scare yourself. As of 2014, the Chinese government has also opened a new trail on the top of the peak to make it easier to visit all the peaks and just implemented an $8.3 million-command center so it can monitor the trails through video cameras.

4 Stromboli Aeolian Islands, Italy

Best for: Watching lava burst out of a volcano Distance: 1,312 vertical feet

Thrust up from the ocean bottom to rise above the Tyrrhenian Sea, the seven volcanic Aeolian Islands have been compared to the Pleiades in the sky and were the mythological home of Aeolus, god of the winds. This reputation is well earned, since rough winds and waves can often ground the hydrofoils that jet between the islands and back to the Sicilian mainland.

The crown jewel of this magical archipelago is Stromboli, a small (7.8-square-mile), cone-shaped, active volcano that spews fire and magma all day long. And while the volcano is certainly dangerous, it’s also regular and predictable enough that hikers can scramble to the 3,034-foot summit and peer into the spewing, molten workings of Vulcan in three active craters. The stunning lava bomb eruptions at the top are believed to have been going off every 20 minutes or so continuously for the past 2,000 years, with occasional lava flows and major eruptions (the last scoured the sides in 2007, and a big blast in 2003 closed the peak for two years).

Hiking to the craters at night is a life-list achievement. Depending on the state of the volcano you can stand within about 500 feet of the crater and enjoy nature’s best fireworks display. There is of course a very small chance that a major eruption could occur (although the volcano has been so consistent for millennia that the term “strombolian eruption” defines this type of activity) but you must hike the peak with a local guide, who tracks the status of the volcano. The hike itself, which heads quickly up through fragrant wild herbs and scrub oak, was rerouted and improved in 2004 with benches along the way and handrails near cliffs.

Thrill Factor: There aren’t many other places on the planet where you can witness the workings of an erupting volcano this close in relative safety.

3 Besseggen Ridge Jotunheimen National Park, Norway

Best for: Anyone who wants a thrill (and big views of Norway’s most famous national park) without a truly dangerous hike Distance: 14 miles one-way

This may be the most popular hike in Norway, calling to everyone from starry-eyed college-age backpackers to pudgy middle-age trekkers, but that’s not to say it doesn’t dish out some true excitement. It also serves up one of the most stunning views on the planet as it ascends and crosses the thin, rocky ridge between Jotunheimen National Park’s big, milky green glacial-fed Gjende lake and high alpine Bessvatnet lake. “Jotunheimen” means “home of the giants” in Norwegian, and it’s easy to imagine the great fierce Jotun of Norse mythology wrestling with Thor in this wild, glacial-scoured landscape—though the 30,000 people who hike it each year may keep the giants in hiding.

If you walk in the most popular direction, beginning at the charming Memurubu hut, the hike opens with a relaxing ferry boat cruise up Gjende before it starts to head up 1,200 feet onto the rocky ridge with steep drop-offs to either side, but the only true danger is stopping too often to snap photos. It tops out at 5,719 feet, racking up an impressive 3,500 verts along the way. The hike ends at the same place you caught the ferry, the Norwegian Mountain Touring Association’s Gjendesheim Turisthytte, a 170-guest mountain lodge. There are ways to extend the trip, too: if you start at Gjendesheim and hike over the ridge to Memurubu, you can stay at the hut overnight and take the ferry back (or hike back over the ridge or along the lake).

Thrill Factor: It’s a demanding eight-hour hike, so though it doesn’t require technical skills, hikers do need to be in shape and be comfortable in the wild.

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El Caminito del Rey (The King’s Pathway) El Chorro, Spain

Best for: True daredevils; GoPro addicts Distance: 2 miles

No list of thrill-ride hikes would be complete without including Spain’s King’s Pathway. The century-old, three-foot wide, decrepit stone walkway that’s barely attached to a sheer cliff 300 feet over the Guadalhorce River has gained fame from a countless number of videos that have gone viral—it is the perfect gasp-and-groan video for helmet-cam footage. It’s also truly risky: Left in bad shape after decades of neglect, the walkway has big gaps that force hikers to step over the void. It’s nausea-inducing enough to travel where the walkway is intact or the few spots where the original handrail still exists. In the worst sections, the pathway is completely gone, requiring low-level rock climbing moves to get back to (semi) solid ground. “Better” spots offer rails of rebar jutting out from the cliff as footholds. There is a safety wire running along the path that can be clipped into to prevent a fall, making it a via ferrata, but the trip is still terrifying.

The catwalk was not always so horrifying. It was originally built in 1905 as a means for hydroelectric workers to travel between Chorro Falls and Gaitanejo Falls. It received its name in 1921, when Spain’s King Alfonso XIII made the walk to open the new Conde del Guadalhorce dam. Ten years later the king ended up fleeing the country and abdicating after the end of the bloody Spanish Civil War. His walkway, likewise, fell out of favor until now.

Thrill Factor: This path is so dangerous that it has been officially closed since 2000 after four people fell to their deaths on it. But since so many adventure-seekers have been drawn to it anyway and guides even take tourists along it, the Spanish government has sunk over $11 million into rebuilding El Camino del Rey to be safer and constructing a visitor center. It is scheduled to open in 2015. The upside of that work is that the renovated path will be far safer; the downside, it will not be nearly as scary.

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YOu’ve reaD The arTicLe and now you’re ready to exprience the thrills. But which hike is best for you? We’ve got you covered- check out our handy hiking quiz to see which hill you should take on.

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