Best New Trips in the World: Exploring Laos's Northern Hill Country

For our annual Adventure Travel issue, we scoured the globe to find the 25 Best New Trips in the World for 2010, complete with a Best Trips photo gallery. Today, we present Laos. The world's far corners are now well within reach.

Laos: An Off-Limits Jungle

Traveling in Laos has always meant either a quick jaunt to Luang Prabang (the former royal capital city) or a monthlong expedition into terrain that wasn’t always worth the trip—think mosquitoes and a hothouse climate. But a new lodge in Laos’s hill country, north of Luang Prabang, is ushering in a fresh era of tourism. Reachable via the Ou River, Muang La Resort and its fleet of powerboats have transformed what was once a multiday water taxi ride to the region into a five-hour cruise. Guests can book rooms directly with Muang La or leave the planning to Asia Transpacific Journeys, the first (and so far, only) outfitter to run trips here.

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Best New Trips in the World: Track Lions in Kenya's Campi ya Kanzi

For our annual Adventure Travel issue, we scoured the globe to find the 25 Best New Trips in the World for 2010, complete with a Best Trips photo gallery. Today, we present Kenya. The world's far corners are now well within reach.

KENYA: Save the King!

Lion kills cow, Maasai warrior kills lion. It’s a centuries-old conflict in the Kenyan bush. But in the past ten years lion populations across Africa have plummeted from 100,000 to 23,000, transforming the issue into a full-fledged crisis. Alarmed research crews have come to Kenya to study the cats and teach the Maasai ways to live with them harmoniously. But one conservation group is way ahead of the curve. Kuku Group Ranch, a 280,000-acre spread in the Chyulu Hills of southern Kenya, is entirely owned and operated by the Maasai themselves. And so far they’ve had dramatic success with their cat-protection efforts: In a recent 30-month period, the ranch’s lion population jumped from 15 to 52. Now, in conjunction with Geographic Expeditions, Kuku will bring in its first guest-researchers.

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New Trip: Private Safari Tracking Gorillas and Rhinos in Rwanda and Kenya

As of today, Baobab Expeditions (see our rating of the company) is offering an 11-day private gorilla and rhino safari in Rwanda and Kenya, led by the most impressive of experts: Dr. Clare Richardson, president of the venerable Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund International. An authority on gorilla research, she'll take you mountain gorilla tracking and score you rare access to Karisoke Research Center, the only gorilla research center in the world.

Best New Trips in the World: Hike Ireland's Northern Coast

For our annual Adventure Travel issue, we scoured the globe to find the 25 Best New Trips in the World for 2010, complete with a Best Trips photo gallery. Today, we present Ireland. The world's far corners are now well within reach.

Ireland: Northern Ireland, Finally

Even if Ireland’s north coast weren’t the setting for Country Walkers’ new trek, the trip would still be one of a kind. Few walks pack as much history, geological drama, and fine whiskey into a single weeklong route. Hikers spend their first three nights based at Bushmills Inn in County Antrim, once a layover for horse-drawn coaches en route to Bushmills Distillery (licensed by King James I in 1608). Sample a dram from the bar’s private reserve, or hold out for a tasting with the distillery manager. From the inn you can hike the Giant’s Causeway, a collection of polygonal stone “pillars” created by a volcanic eruption that dips down into the sea.

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Best New Trips in the World: Hike and Kayak in Iceland's Nature Reserve

For our annual Adventure Travel issue, we scoured the globe to find the 25 Best New Trips in the World for 2010, complete with a Best Trips photo gallery. Today, we present Iceland. The world's far corners are now well within reach.

Iceland: Into the Arctic Circle

At first glance, the fjord-y, fragmented northwest corner of Iceland looks like a country apart. And in some ways it is. It was here, in the Westfjords, that medieval outlaws came to board ships bound for unknown lands, and where winter conditions still keep neighboring farmers from visiting one another. Today, intrepid hikers are starting to explore the region’s signature draw, Hornstrandir Nature Reserve; next summer, Explorers’ Corner will become the sole outfitter to approach it just as the Vikings did—by sea. The itinerary is flexible by design: Campsites can change depending on the whims of the group, and you’ll have the option of hiking to snowcaps, poking around the remains of Viking farms, and watching puffins and goosanders from your kayak.

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Throw Down Your Heart: Bela Fleck Finds the Banjo's African Roots

American banjo virtuoso Bèla Fleck is known for bringing his instrument across genres. Today you can watch him bring it across the Atlantic and back to its beginnings in his new DVD.

Fleck and Sascha Paladino's documentary, Throw Down Your Heart, chronicles the making of Fleck's latest CD as he travels Africa in an attempt to bring the banjo back to its African roots. The film focuses on music, but there's a taste of African landscape and culture too. Fleck's adventure takes him to Uganda, Tanzania, Gambia, and Mali, with stops ranging from tiny rural villages to large cities.

Whether searching for the roots of your favorite instrument or a glimpse of an endangered gorilla, you can explore the continent, too. Check out our favorite African adventures here.—Greer Schott

Elephants or Sharks? Pick Which Young Explorer Gets NG Funding

We don't normally advocate for armchair adventures over the real thing, but when the National Geographic Channel's Expedition Week starts up November 15th, we highly recommend a snagging a front row seat. You'll be searching for Amazon headshrinkers and tagging great white sharks...from the comforts of your living room. And, for the first time, you can help pick which conservation-focused expedition National Geographic will sponsor next.

The Contenders: Filmmaker Trip Jennings and Photographer Ben Horton.

Best New Trips in the World: Bike France's Pyrenees

For our annual Adventure Travel issue, we scoured the globe to find the 25 Best New Trips in the World for 2010, complete with a Best Trips photo gallery. Today, we present France. The world's far corners are now well within reach.

France: Tour des Pyrenees

If the gods were cyclists, you can rest assured that there would be more mountains like the Pyrenees. The 11,000-foot peaks separating France from Spain are laced with hundreds of miles of paved roads winding past medieval villages and stretches of high-alpine wilderness. For the past half century, cycling fanatics have been completing the Raid Pyrénéen, a hundred-hour cyclathon across the range on a fixed course. But other than Raid crews (and, of course, the annual swarm of Tour de France riders) the Pyrenees are mostly crowd free. “One of the big advantages to this area is that there are very few cars,” says Loren Siekman, owner of Discover France. Now, DF has developed an outfitted version of the Pyrenees crossing, using a different route and a saner, weeklong pace. The traverse begins near chilly Atlantic waters in Biarritz.

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10 Spooky Adventure Destinations Around the Globe

Just in time for Halloween, we've pulled together our list of the top 10 scariest adventure spots around the world. We're not talking your average haunted hayride: These destinations have a long history of creepy lore. They're also great adventure destinations, just make sure to pack your garlic necklace and your silver bullets.—Greer Schott

Sleepy Hollow, New York

Made famous by Washington Irving's spooky tale The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, this historic town is the quintessential eerie fall destination. By day, experience the colorful foliage on the Old Croton Aqueduct Trailway: it passes the Pocatino River near the spot where the Irving's Headless Horseman scared Icabod Crane. At night, visit Irving's headstone as you tour the town graveyard by lantern; you might just hear the faint sound of hooves pounding and heads rolling in the distance.

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Catacombs of Palermo, Italy

If you thought the catacombs of Paris were creepy, brace yourself. In the Capuchin Catacombs of Palermo, Italy, you wont just see a few old bones. Skin, hair, and clothing hang on the intact skeletons of people long deceased. Walking among these dead bodies makes for one of the ghostliest adventures out there.

St. Louis Cemetery #1, New Orleans's Oldest City of the Dead

One of our 100 Adventure Towns, New Orleans has plenty of non-bone chilling adventures. But walk through the vast cemeteries of above-ground graves known as the City of the Dead, and you'll see why this is one of the spookiest spots around. Visit the grave of Voodoo Queen Marie Laveau, rumored to have walked the streets of the city even after her death in 1881. If you perform a series of knocks and leave an offering at her tomb, you can channel her power and perform your own Voodoo curse. Or so legend goes. Just make sure to go in a group: Muggers sometimes lurk in the narrow paths between large tombs.

Best New Trips in the World: Hike and Rappel on Costa Rica's Caribbean Coast

For our annual Adventure Travel issue, we scoured the globe to find the 25 Best New Trips in the World for 2010, complete with a Best Trips photo gallery. Today, we present Costa Rica. The world's far corners are now well within reach.

Costa Rica: Coast Confidential

With Costa Rica’s Pacific coast looking more and more like Southern California’s —overdeveloped and overcrowded—it’s a far cry from the adventure getaway of 15 years ago. And until recently, the country’s other coast, the Caribbean, simply wasn’t a viable alternative. But the extension of a paved road to CR’s far east has unlocked the area’s beaches and parks, and inspired one outfitter to launch a new trip. Wildland Adventures’ nine-day excursion begins near the Panama border at Selva Bananito Lodge, a family-owned eco-retreat on a private, 2,000-acre preserve. You can hike through rain forest, rappel down an 80-foot waterfall, and help reintroduce a tropical hardwood forest to the area by planting trees on a rundown 19th-century banana plantation.

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