Boise trail is Idaho’s most popular hike, ranking shows — but most states outrank us
An iconic Boise trail is Idaho’s top hiking destination, according to a new ranking compiled using social media and search data, but the state falls far behind most others when it comes to popularity.
According to an analysis published last week by outdoor clothing brand and travel website Kühl, Table Rock Trail is searched on Google and shared on Instagram more than any other hike in Idaho. That boosted the nearly 4-mile Foothills trail to the state’s top spot despite average ratings and reviews on the hiking app AllTrails.
Though Table Rock led Idaho’s list, its ranking paled in comparison to other states’ top trails.
Kühl created lists of the top-rated AllTrails routes for every state, then analyzed the number of Google searches, Instagram mentions and AllTrails reviews as well as the AllTrails ranking for each route. Using that data, the company created a top-20 ranking for each U.S. state, as well as nationwide rankings.
Table Rock’s overall score — a standardized calculation based on the data Kühl collected — was a meager 1.42. In contrast, the most popular U.S. trail, Angel’s Landing in Utah’s Zion National Park, earned a 7.1.
It wasn’t just breathtaking national and state park destinations that outranked Idaho’s best offering (although there were plenty of those, including Half Dome in California’s Yosemite National Park and Laurel Falls Trail in Smoky Mountains National Park). Only 13 other states had a lower score on their top-ranked trail. Rhode Island earned the lowest ranking with its top trail, Sachuest Point National Wildlife Refuge Trail, scoring just 0.91.
In all, 184 other trails outranked Table Rock, which stood above other popular Idaho hikes including Pettit Lake, Goat Lake and Sawtooth Lake in the Sawtooths and Tubbs Hill in Coeur d’Alene.
It’s a departure from Idaho’s usual status as a list-topping state in similar outdoor rankings. According to data shared by Kühl, Idaho’s smaller population and tourism industry may have led to the lower listing. Table Rock topped the state rankings with 3,500 Google searches and 2,100 Instagram mentions in the past 12 months, but that’s a fraction of other states’ numbers.
Half Dome search count was 10 times that of Table Rock’s, while the “most Instagrammable” hike, Skyline Trail in Oklahoma’s Beavers Bend State Park, was shared on the social media site nearly 50,000 times.
