Liz Thomas is a professional hiker, adventure conservationist, and outdoor writer who broke the women’s self-supported speed record on the 2,181-mile long Appalachian Trail. Considered among the most experienced hikers in the US, she’s known for backpacking light, fast, and solo. Liz has hiked more than 20,000 miles on 20+ long trails including completing the Triple Crown of Hiking (the Appalachian, Pacific Crest, and Continental Divide Trails) and first-known traverses of the Chinook Trail in the Columbia River Gorge and Wasatch Range in Utah.
“A living legend...the Queen of Urban Hiking”
Called “a living legend” and “the Queen of Urban Hiking” by Outside Magazine, Thomas is also known as an urban hiker for developing and hiking 100+ mile routes in 13 U.S. cities from Los Angeles to New York, including a 100-mile hike to all the breweries in Denver and a 225 mile hike to all the new playgrounds in New York City. She’s used her platform for advocacy surrounding staying active where you are and building safe streets and smarter cities.
Liz is the author of Long Trails: Mastering the Art of the Thru-hike, which received the National Outdoor Book Award for Best Instructional book with judges calling it “destined to become the bible of the sport.” She recently published her second guidebook, Hiking Waterfalls in Southern California with Falcon Guides.
“Every so often a book comes along, finds broad acceptance, and becomes the bible of a sport. “”
Liz has been seen on Good Morning America and in the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, The Guardian, Men’s Journal, Women’s Health, Gizmodo, and Yahoo!News. She is a contributing editor and columnist at Backpacker Magazine and instructs their online class, “Thru-hiking 101.”
Liz served as the Vice President of the American Long Distance Hiking Association-West from 2013-2017 and is currently an ambassador for American Hiking Society (2010- present) and on the Board of the Partnership for the National Trail System. A former outdoor staff writer at Wirecutter/New York Times, Liz is editor in chief at Treeline Review, an outdoor gear magazine.
In her time not on trail, Liz attained a Masters in Environmental Science from the Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies and the prestigious Doris Duke Conservation Fellowship for her research on long distance hiking trails, conservation, and trail town communities—a project she applied to her work with the trail non-profit Continental Divide Trail Coalition and New England National Scenic Trail/Connecticut Forests & Parks Association.
When not hiking, Liz splits her time between Denver, CO and Los Angeles, CA.