US State Lowpoints

Highpointing, upside down

Somebody was always going to do this. Lowpointing — visiting the lowest elevation in each state — started as a joke among highpointers and has quietly become its own thing, partly because it's so much easier on the knees. The list runs from Badwater Basin in Death Valley, 282 feet below sea level and the lowest spot in North America, up to Colorado's lowpoint on the Arikaree River at 3,317 feet, which is higher than the highpoints of eighteen other states.

Twenty-three states bottom out at sea level, which means any stretch of their coastline counts. For those, the pin on this map marks a representative spot — Coney Island, Tybee Island, Galveston — but the beach of your choice is just as valid. Louisiana's is the only other below-sea-level entry: New Orleans, eight feet under, which locals will tell you about at length.

The interesting ones

The inland lowpoints are the real collector's items because they're usually the point where a river leaves the state. Arizona's is the Colorado River at the Mexican border near Yuma; Idaho's is the Snake at Lewiston, the furthest inland seaport on the West Coast; Kentucky's is the Mississippi at the Kentucky Bend, a loop of the river that can only be reached by driving through Tennessee. West Virginia's is Harpers Ferry, where the Potomac and Shenandoah meet — a town that's worth the trip regardless.

Click a badge or its pin to mark a lowpoint reached, again for want-to-go. The real list is on the highpoints map; this one is for the drive home.

Getting there

Badwater is the only lowpoint with a visitor center nearby and a sign, and it's the one to make a trip of: Death Valley in winter is superb, and the basin's salt flats with the sea-level marker painted high on the cliff behind you is the photo. Most inland lowpoints are a riverbank at a state line, reachable by a county road and a short walk, and part of the appeal is that they take you to places with no tourism at all. Wyoming's Belle Fourche River crossing, Nebraska's Missouri River bank, and Oklahoma's Little River are as far from a gift shop as you can get.