Customer Reviews

Mexico's Volcanoes: A Climbing Guide

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

 

 

The book has a comprehensive list of routes for each mountain, it also provides good advice for begineers. However, there are two things I don't like form this book: 1) Need an update to reflect latest changes (Popo for example) 2) The book looks too simplistic, the format is ver bad for the type of information. The book has very few quality photos and the routes are difficult to follow.

I wish I could find a more up-to-date book about these beatiful mountains

I am an experienced world traveler and mountain climber who used this book in 1999. I must say, I have never been so disappointed with a travel book in all my life. A few points: in the little town of Tlachichuca, Secor leads you to ONE person for climbing assistance. Knowing that, they take FULL advantage of climbers, grossly overcharging for services. Two: Secor's route descriptions are seemingly detailed but upon use are revealed as painfully inadequate. For instance, at Citlaltépetl, Secor makes not one word of mention regarding "la lengua", the tongue of the glacier, which turns out to be the most difficult part of the whole ascent. Finally, and this is the most personal and non-important point to a casual reader, I don't like Secor's decision to follow the poor precedent set by the Mountaineers of favoring non-indigenous peak names. Thus as Tahoma and Koma Kulshan became Rainier and Baker, the majestic Citlaltépetl is reduced to Pico de Orizaba. All in all, this is a good start (given the lack of anything better) but definitely make sure that every piece of information used from this book is followed up by a second source to avoid certain rip off and/or disappointment.

I spent last winter in Mexico and used Secor's book to climb the volcanoes in the country. It has been a helpful guide and in the main is full of accurate detail as far as in country information is concerned but it does need updating in certain areas. The details for climbing La Malinche and Nevado Toluca for example are quite poor and have hardly no descriptive value at all. Both volcanoes are actually very beautiful hikes and both contain a number of routes that are not mentioned in the book. The route details in the book therefore do not do justice to these volcanoes. Scrambling over Nevado Toluca for example is a joy and the 'Complete rim traverse' (not mentioned in the book) rivals any horseshoe scramble South of Scotland in the UK. Overall however it is a good guide book and the route details for the other peaks in Mexico are good. I hope this book does get updated however as there is a need for such a guide as Mexico's volcanoes are superb to climb and are a great introduction to those who want to progress to the higher peaks of the Andes.

RJ did a great job with this book. I used it way back in 1988 to climb the 3 big ones and found it absolutely accurate. He's got some great tips in there too!