50 Hikes in Mount Rainier National Park: Amazon.ca: Books

Inside This Book (Learn More)

First Sentence
The National Park Act of 1916 declares that the purpose of Mount Rainier National Park is "to conserve the scenery and the natural and historic objects and the wildlife . . . ." Read the first page

Explore More
Concordance

Tag this product

(What's this?)

Think of a tag as a keyword or label you consider is strongly related to this product.
Tags will help all customers organize and find favorite items.

Customer Reviews

4 Reviews

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

Average Customer Review

2.8 out of 5 stars (4 customer reviews)

Share your thoughts with other customers:

Create your own review

Most helpful customer reviews

2.0 out of 5 stars A Yawner, Jun 20 2002

By

Alfred Bernoulli (Olympia WA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: 50 Hikes in Mount Rainier National Park (Paperback)

The best thing you can say about this umpteenth edition of this guide is that it has some nice color pictures. Even then, though, they aren't always accurate - like the picture of Ranger Falls, which really isn't Ranger Falls, but a lower falls about a quarter-mile down the trail from the real Ranger Falls. Or the picture of the "Avalanche lily" on page 69, which is really a glacier lily. You'd think a pair of old veterans like Ira Spring and Harvey Manning would know things like that.
That first photo is on the Green Lake hike, which the author tells you starts at elevation 985 feet. In fact, the elevation at the trailhead is about 2,100 feet. There are several mistakes like this throughout the book, which makes me wonder how carefully the book has been edited. After all, they've had four tries.
The maps aren't really maps at all, but confusing little sketches which show you very little about the trail you will be walking. There are no contour lines and pitifully few elevations given, and you've got to wade through paragraphs of boring, often preachy text to find out whether the trail is uphill or downhill on specific sections. Compare these useless cartoons to the clear, excellent topographic maps in Ron C. Judd's new "Day Hike! Mount Rainier," and see which you'd rather try to follow with a compass.
Of all the guides to trails on Mount Rainier, this has got to be the worst.

Help other customers find the most helpful reviews

Was this review helpful to you? Yes No

Report abuse

2.0 out of 5 stars Pretty pictures; but info shows its age, Oct 10 2001

By A Customer

This review is from: 50 Hikes in Mount Rainier National Park (Paperback)

The new color pics are great, but one has to wonder if Harvey, et al, are letting the details slip in their golden years. One whole section, for trails on the (washed out) West Side Road, tells you to get on the "shuttle bus" and be dropped off at the trailhead -- when in fact no such bus exists, and probably won't for years, according to park rangers. This minor inconvenience adds as much as 10 miles to some of those hikes -- and these distances are NOT spelled out in the guide. There also seeems to be sloppy editing; more than one altitude-gain stats are wrong, as in, 2,300 rather than 3,200. That's a big difference. Also, like other Mountaineers guides released recently, the authors in this one seem to be at war with their own publishers. Example: The route they suggest to Indian Henry's Hunting Grounds is no longer even maintained by the park, and another route is described on the next page as "safer." Why, then, include the old route? The authors might want to spend less time defending their old choices and more time making new ones. I'm frankly not interested in the best hikes in the park circa 1965. In sum: Worth having for the pics, but supplement it with something else for trail data.

Help other customers find the most helpful reviews

Was this review helpful to you? Yes No

Report abuse

4.0 out of 5 stars Very helpful, Aug 17 2001

By

"kreddersen" (Salisbury, MD United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: 50 Hikes in Mount Rainier National Park (Paperback)

This book is a great resource to help you plan your hikes in Mount Rainier National Park. The trail descriptions are good and show trail lengths and level of difficulty. My only complaint about the book is that the individual trail maps throughout the book don't maintain a consistent North/South orientation and can be confusing to follow from one to the next.

Help other customers find the most helpful reviews

Was this review helpful to you? Yes No

Report abuse

Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review

› See all 4 customer reviews on Amazon.ca

Want to see more reviews on this item?

› Go to Amazon.com to see all 9 reviews 3.8 out of 5 stars

Most recent customer reviews

3.0 out of 5 stars Pretty good guide, but has some downsides
Overall this book is well put together. The hikes are organized according to their location in the park so you can quickly find hikes that are close the entrace you are using... Read more

Published on July 25 2000 by Douglas Welzel