American Discovery Trail, Coast-to-coast long-distance trail from Delaware to California, United States.
The American Discovery Trail is a long-distance hiking route that runs from the Atlantic coast in Delaware to the Pacific shore in California, covering approximately 6800 miles (10900 kilometers). The route passes through national forests, mountain ranges, farmland, and city neighborhoods across fifteen states.
Trail planners completed the full route in the 1990s by linking older footpaths and wagon roads used during westward migration in the 1800s. Some segments follow traces of the Pony Express and stage lines that once carried mail and passengers between frontier towns.
In 2019, a mural on Greene Square in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, marked the trail's passage through downtown and the Cedar Lake-Smokestack Bridge project. The route also links to the Buckeye Trail in Ohio and the Continental Divide Trail, so long-distance walkers share paths with local users. Near the Mississippi, hikers cross a landscape of farms and river towns whose layout follows the waterway.
The trail splits into northern and southern alternates between Ohio and Colorado: the northern branch crosses Indiana, Illinois, Iowa and Nebraska, the southern one Kentucky, Indiana, Illinois, Missouri and Kansas. The northern route measures 4,834 miles (7,780 km), the southern 5,057 miles (8,138 km). Hikers can also ride horses on much of the route.
Argentine Pass in Colorado sits at 13207 feet (4023 meters) above sea level, while the California Delta section dips to 17 feet (5 meters) below sea level. This range shows the full sweep of terrain a hiker crosses from alpine tundra to tidal marshes.
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