The Instagram Experiment in Ranking Hiking Difficulty (And the Real Top 10 Hardest Day Hikes in America)

What makes a hike “hard”?Why do some routes feel impossible to one person and casual to another?And why did our Instagram difficulty experiment got 300,000 views and exploded into a storm of opinions, contradictions, and zero usable data?In this episode, Philip and Jason pull back the curtain on the Blisterpop Difficulty Scale — the five‑pillar system designed to bring clarity to a world full of noise. They break down why rating difficulty is so challenging, why crowdsourced answers always collapse, and how the scale measures physical load, environmental severity, technicality, logistics, and psychological demand with real structure instead of vibes.You’ll hear the story of the failed IG experiment, the philosophy behind inclusion and exclusion, and the honest truth about why no difficulty list will ever be complete. This is the definitive conversation about how we understand challenge, risk, and the big days that shape us.If you’ve ever wondered why some routes feel harder than they score — or why your “easiest” day crushed someone else — this episode is for you.More at: blisterpopadventures.comSupport the show