Customer Reviews

Day Hikes Around Big Sur: 80 Great Hikes

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

We bought this book to take with us on our week long, mostly driving, tour of the middle California coast. We ended up taking about six of the shorter hikes listed. All were wonderful. Honestly, we never would have found most without this book. Apparently no one else would either because we were alone on five of the hikes. The information presented is clear and accurate. We had no trouble finding the trails and they were as advertised in the book. This was a great addition to our resource library for the trip. Highly recommended, at least for the casual traveler/hiker.

GREAT book for hiking in Big Sur. We did many of these hikes and the descriptions on how to access trails/length, etc. was perfect. Great diverse selection of hikes.

Like some of the other reviews have said, this is not a fancy book. However, it does have some great hikes. There are no color pictures or major details, but the basics are there. The mileage, elevation, driving directions, hiking directions and map are all given. I recently moved to this area and bought the book. So far it has been great. I recommend it.

I have been to Big Sur hundreds of times due to living nearby for several years...but I had never hiked there. Two years ago I decided I needed to see some trails, not just look at things from the cliffs. The picture on the front cover is of McWay Falls. What a hidden treasure. It is right off Hwy 1. You park, go down a very short trail and around the first curve is this beautiful waterfall that empties into the Pacific Ocean. I was absolutely astounded. The cover of the book interested me initially, but the book is worth it's cover price. This was a hidden treasure to me but McWay Falls is actually quite famous. Somehow I found that the author created a web site during the time that I was going to do my first hikes. Unfortunately, I was going shortly after the North Sur fire. I found information on the author's website that I was not able to find on any fire site. It is the web site that has the pictures,etc. Get the book and go to the interactive website. He kept it up to date. I was going for a one week stay and was very disheartened. Due to the fire most of the trails were closed...but then there was McWay Falls, right by Hwy 1...open,open,open. I got to hike 1/4 mile!

This is not a horrible book, but its not a great book either. The book looks and feels like the publisher had some cost constraints he put himself under.

Pros: 1. There were some hikes under here that I would not have though of. 2. The maps, with one major exception ( which is listed in my list of cons ) seems to be pretty professionally done. There was nothing hand scribbled here.

Cons: 1. Maps - there is a little compass on each that shows where North is pointing. Sometimes north is pointed up, but a lot of times it isn't. This one of the items that says the publisher was cutting costs, and it really shows 2. There was nothing in the different hike descriptions that got me excited about that hike. 3. No pictures - another case of the publisher cutting costs.