Jerry SchadBesprekingen

I just bought a new copy after my old one went missing. Now seven years old, this edition is getting slightly out of date, but remains the best guide to San Diego hiking trails around. Very clear and helpful, plus you learn a little natural history about each area.

Rides are vary from 6 to 60 miles, most 20-40 miles. Each includes an elevation profile for the ride. Many also include historic information for sites enroute, and interesting stops.

Photos are quite good. Text is historically accurate for the period 8-10 years before the passage of the California Desert Protection Act in 1994. That law changed the names of many areas and added new protections to over 3 million more acres.

Jerry Schad has been writing these detailed guides to hiking in San Diego for many years. I have several previous editions, and this one is a welcomed addition to the collection as it covers many areas after the Cedar Fire of 2003. Schad profiles the hikes according to difficulty, provides maps and directions, and writes a step-by-step illustration of the experience of walking on each trail. The book is divided into areas of San Diego County, so that the reader can select a chapter according to which area he/she might choose to travel to that day. Schad also recommends the best season for experiencing each trail. This is a great book for natives of San Diego County who want to get to know their tourist options as walkers, birders, or hikers. It is also a wonderful tool for visitors of San Diego who would be interested in the outdoors.

Jerry Schad has been writing these detailed guides to hiking in San Diego for many years. I have several previous editions, and this one is a welcomed addition to the collection as it covers many areas after the Cedar Fire of 2003. Schad profiles the hikes according to difficulty, provides maps and directions, and writes a step-by-step illustration of the experience of walking on each trail. The book is divided into areas of San Diego County, so that the reader can select a chapter according to which area he/she might choose to travel to that day. Schad also recommends the best season for experiencing each trail. This is a great book for natives of San Diego County who want to get to know their tourist options as walkers, birders, or hikers. It is also a wonderful tool for visitors of San Diego who would be interested in the outdoors.

One of my favorite hiking guides

Hiking has become my latest obsession, and this handy guide, known as the bible of San Diego hiking and trekking, is a big help in making my way around the county! The trips are organized into geographic areas (ex: Mountain, Coastal, Desert), and all pertinent information is provided (distance, time, difficulty, ideal season). Rough maps are shown, and the highlights of each hike are described at length. There is a trip for every type of hiker in this book, from low-key coastal walks to multi-day bushwacking adventures. I've made it a life goal to complete every hike in the book, but time will tell whether or not that is a realistic dream or not, as a handful of the hikes are extremely challenging and require significant backpacking experience. I'm currently using an old version of the book, but I plan to purchase the new version as well, since there are many more hikes to choose from. Also included, as appendices, are lists of "best hikes," recommended reading, and park contact information. I highly recommend this book to all adventuring types, and I plan to check out Schad's Orange County version as well.

This was my Hiking Bible during my Hiking Decade (my twenties) during the 90s when I spent just about every weekend in So Cal's local mountains exploring summits, abandoned mines, hard to reach waterfalls (like the one featured on the cover -- Fish Fork Falls -- an 18 mile round trip heartpounder which literally requires swimming in spots in order to reach your destination), the "Bridge to Nowhere" -- a highway bridge built in 1936, seventy feet above the East Fork of The San Gabriel River which, after the great flood of March, 1938, left little of the road but the bridge, and which is now owned by a bungee-jumping company (hike in five miles and leap off a bridge!) -- the ruins of trail "resorts" from the "Great Hiking Era" of the early 1900s, abandoned "trails", hidden GPS markers, tunnels, cross country bushwhacking routes, swimming holes, natural waterslides, fire lookouts and whatnot.

Schad's descriptions are spot on, his mileages and directions uncannily accurate (compared to a lot of other So Cal hiking guides), and he writes in an engaging manner that makes you curious about what he's describing; curious to lace on those lug-soled water-proof boots, tie on that bandanna and bolt for the trails!½

If you're ever in Orange County, CA and want to know how you can get out into the wild beyond the kind of wild that's been stereotyped by the thankfully defunct TV show, "The O.C." and hopefully soon-to-be defunct reality show, "The Real Housewives of Orange County", then please, by all means, pick up a copy of this excellent hiking guide. There's a lot more wild to Orange County than you might expect at first glance: redrock canyons, waterfalls, strenuous hikes to the summits of 5,500 foot-plus peaks (often snowcapped after storms), natural arches, sea carved shoreline grottos & tidal pools great for kids & exploring. Schad, in his usual, obsessively precise manner, concisely though encyclopedically, takes you into every nook and cranny of Orange County that, thankfully, only a small percentage of the OCs population know about.

Excellent overview of the best hiking (ranging from easy beach walks to excrutiating treks) in all of S. CA. The only hiking guide I'm aware of with a description of the hike that's even more difficult than doing Mt. Whitney in one day -- hiking from Palm Springs all the way to the summit of Mt. San Jacinto (10,000 ft. vertical climb, the first two-thirds of which traverses exceptionally steep desert terrain on an unmaintained, unmarked, and at times difficult to follow trail which the US forest service officially recommends you not use). The book is worth buying merely for including this incredible hike.

Lots of other fun destinations described too. Schad is always precise in his directions to the trailhead, and even his off trail, cross-country routes are dependable. His knowledge of hiking opportunites in S. CA is unmatched by any other author.