The High Sierra: Peaks, Passes, and Trails (Paperback)

~ (Author) "The High Sierra, which I have defined as the region between the southern boundary of Sequoia National Park and the northern boundary of Yosemite National..." (more)
Key Phrases: Further Reading, High Sierra, John Muir Trail (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Review

Provides extensive information useful to hikers, climbers, skiers, and visitors to the region in a detailed, easy-to-follow format. -- Wyoming Tribune-Eagle

Product Description

A new edition of the only guide to detail all the known routes on 570 peaks in the Sierras, thoroughly updated, with 60+ pages of new material covering 80 new routes, and new photos throughout.

The diverse terrain and unspoiled wilderness of the High Sierra makes it one of the best places in the world for "the practice of mountains" - advanced hiking, cross-country rambling, peak bagging, rock and ice climbing, and ski touring. Here it is possible to begin a hike in the desert of the eastern Sierra, scale rock and ice to a mountain top, and end in the lush redwood groves of the western slopes.

The most comprehensive resource on this explorer's paradise, The High Sierra details all the major and minor routes to the area and covers approach roads, trails, and cross-country and climbing routes. Sections called "Wrinkles" provide alternative and lesser-known linkage routes between and within regions.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 463 pages
• Publisher: Mountaineers Books; 2 Sub edition (May 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0898866251
• ISBN-13: 978-0898866254
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 7 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (20 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #710,378 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

18 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The most complete source for Sierra hikers and mountaineers., May 31, 2000

By	Bob Rockwell (Ridgecrest, CA USA) - See all my reviews

If you must own only one guidebook for the Sierra Nevada, this is the one to get. Here, Secor expands upon his first edition--itself being built on those which have gone before. With each new version, improvement comes from the additional routes, new information, more illustrations. And, errors are found and corrected.

The pictures are particularly good this time around, with many of the important routes sketched in. Many climbers will prefer to simply take along a copy of the picture (first getting the publisher's permission, of course) rather than the written description.

No matter what your reasons are for venturing into the high country, this book should satisfy all your planning and informational needs, and then some. An unfortunate byproduct is that--at over 460 pages and 2 pounds--few people will want to carry it on their backcountry trips.

Simply put, Secor writes excellent guidebooks, and his experience shows. If I have any quibble with his present effort, it is that a number of the climbing routes are unnecessarily detailed and descriptive, leaving little for the first-timer to discover for himself. However, I have heard others say that many route descriptions are too skimpy for their liking, so you just can't please everyone.

15 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars good "beyond the trail" guide, May 21, 2002

By	Sebastian Kaiser (New Haven, CT United States) - See all my reviews

I bought this book before heading out to the SF bay area for a summer project last year. I mainly used descriptions of off-trail routes to do some 1-day scrambles on various peaks in the Sierra as well as for an excursion off the John Muir trail on a backpacking trip through King's Canyon NP.
This book is meant for off-trail travel and technical climbing (and mostly the latter). If you really only want to stick to the trail it's the wrong guide, but the nice thing about the Sierra is that it's easy to leave the trail. I'm not a technical climber, but because the book is very comprehensive there's still lots of interesting stuff for me. It has shown me a side of the Sierrra that, being not familiar with this part of the US at all, I probably would not have seen otherwise.

19 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great book for hard-core mountaineers, March 22, 2003

By	Ross James Browne (Atlanta, Georgia United States) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

If you want to climb as many peaks as possible in the High Sierra, this is your book. Secor describes an enormous number of different hiking/climbing opportunities. He does not bother with the most obvious stuff, such as well-known trails that are easy to find, but instead tells you about places you might not have thought about. There is information on cross-country routes (such as George Creek, Tuttle Creek, and the Enchanted Gorge), which is important because these rough and difficult routes are not discussed in trail guides, and are also overlooked in climbing guides. This book might not be enough information for doing a technical climb on a big wall like Lone Pine Mountain or Tehipite Dome, but will tell you about the approach routes. This is useful if you want to get a good look at these mountains from some neighboring ridge, but don't necessarily want to scale the actual cliffs. It is better for wilderness trekking, off-trail hiking, and mountaineering than it is for pure wall climbing. It is therefore an ideal guide for people who want to cover a lot of ground and see some extremely remote and beautiful scenery rather than stay at one site and go up and down a wall.