If you are into the hiking, mountaineering or climbing, you will surely be interested to see which the best mountains to climb in the world are.
From the point of view of an outsider, climbing and hiking might seem a little weird — you go, climb a mountain, make a few amazing pictures on the way, and that’s it. But when you enter the world of climbing, the whole new horizons open, and you actually see the world from different perspective. And that makes you want to explore. People, of course, have different preferences and goals in life as in climbing, and during the years spent in climbing everybody finds something that they like the best and keep going deeper in the matter.
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But what do we consider climbing to be actually? It depends whom you ask. There are things like mountaineering, sport climbing, traditional climbing, bouldering, ice climbing, hill walking, scrambling just to name some. And since each of these is a science for itself, we will not go through any of them particularly; we will just say that all these divisions are prone to constant changes, inventions and development (both on the matter of technique or equipment), and they inevitably overlap.
If you are a beginner, you will probably not know what to expect when you start climbing, but you will have some ideas in your mind. You might start, say, bouldering and realize you really like ice climbing, and that is OK since one of the points of climbing, in general, is exploring new things and finding yourself in it. So, if you have decided to begin with hiking, we might suggest you search for some mountains to climb for beginners check out 10 Easiest Mountains to Climb in USA, bit also go through the 11 Most Difficult Mountains To Climb In US, to see what to expect later in your climbing career.
Apart from the US, what are some great destinations? First, there is Europe, where all this mountaineering/alpinism/traditional climbing thing begun. And some mountains there still have the reputation of the best mountains to climb in Europe since those starting periods, such as Mont Blanc, the Alps in general, Ortler, Grossglockner or Matterhorn. Then there are the Andes, Peru, for example, and the whole vast Asian area with the world’s most famous and highest Mount Everest and other leas known beauties of the world.
So, what criteria to take in mind when thinking of the best mountains to climb in the world: plain hiking, traditional climbing, mountaineering, via ferratas…? Well, we have decided to take a little from everything, since we are looking for the best mountains to climb in the world, and there certainly is the best from all these categories.
But what are the best mountains anyway? It is totally a matter of personal taste, preferences, and expectations. So, that is why have consulted different opinions on the best mountains to climb in the world. First, we have gone through some National Geographic articles where we have fund compilation of best summit hikes, and climbing peaks picked for different tastes and experiences. Of course, we have also taken in mind beginners in this wonderful activity, so we have also looked for something suitable for them and got some suggestions from the Adventure Sports Network and The Guardian. On the opposite, we have taken in mint the hardest mountains to climb as well from the Rough Guides.
Too many suggestions, and too many opinions, it is not easy to pick the right choice. So, in the end, how did we pick the best mountains to climb in the world? We have looked through the suggestions from the websites we have mentioned above and made our own compilation trying to include as many diverse mountains as we could, from harsh winter routes to amazing views of African and American peaks. And we have tried to rank the list on the number of suggestions and the level of difficulty (more or less).
So, if you are here just for the curiosity or you are planning to ascend some of the best mountains to climb in the world, let’s see our picks on that:
11. Mount Everest, Tibet (China) and Nepal
Elevation: 8,848m (20,029 ft)
Of course, no story that has “best” and “mountain” in the same sentence would avoid mentioning Everest, the tallest and one of the most challenging mountains in the world. Everest has now become more of an ideal and goal that some people spend years and years of preparation to climb. There are several routes that can be picked and two main base camps. The base camp on Nepal only gets around 30,000 tourists a year, but of course, there are much less those who continue up to the top of the world for which of course much more preparation (and money) is needed.
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