Taking to the hills in the Rocky Mountains

The United States Rockies are an outdoor nirvana. They not only offer virtually every possible type of landscape, but also have enough infrastructure to make it all accessible without having so much that it’s over-developed or overcrowded.

Whether its solitude or adrenaline, you can have it all here. There’s plenty of scope for patient wildlife watching, just soaking up meadows full of wildflowers, contemplating life while tramping along a trail or simply whiling away an afternoon fly-fishing for the many healthy trout.

But if it’s action you want, try rafting the Arkansas River, which plummets through gorges that dwarf skyscrapers; or mountain biking hundreds of miles of smooth and winding single-track trails; or hiring a four-wheeler to explore old mining towns deep in the mountains.