The Glorious Mountains of Vancouver's North Shore
(Vancouver Trails: September 5, 2018)
The Glorious Mountains of Vancouver's North Shore: Review 1
(Bivouac.com: August 7, 2018)
B.C. hikers summit every North Shore peak, put together ultimate guide for 'peak baggers' (CBC News: July 21, 2018)
2 hikers summit every North Shore peak, put together ultimate 'peak bagger's' guide
(CBC News: The Early Edition with Stephen Quinn: Jul 16, 2018)
New book goes into detail on glorious North Shore mountains
(North Shore News: July 10, 2018)
The Glorious Mountains of Vancouver's North Shore: Interview with David Crerar
(Ashika Parsad: July 18, 2018)
It all started years ago as a friendly competition to see who could reach the summit of the most North Shore mountains in a single hiking season. 'The North Shore Peak Bagger Challenge' was created in 2009 by David Crerar, and still happens each year through Club Fat Ass.
After years spent exploring the North Shore trails and summiting all its peaks, David Crerar and co-authors Harry Crerar and Bill Maurer spent several more years compiling The Glorious Mountains of Vancouver’s North Shore: A Peakbagger’s Guide. The book was released this July.
And if you were to think this was a simple guidebook with directions on how to scale those peaks yourself, you'd be dead wrong. It's that, plus so much more.
The Peakbagger's Guide comes in at a hefty 504 pages jam-packed with everything you could ever want to know about hiking on the North Shore, including extensive histories on each area and ratings for whether each hike is suitable for dogs and children, among other ratings. My personal favourite rating is the Bang for Buck rating:
"(0-5) Quality of peak in relation to effort involved. 0: punishing and unrewarding; 5: the views, features and route are glorious enough to justify the effort"
If hikes have multiple routes, each of them are covered. Public transit options, whether you can expect cell coverage, water availability... the book has everything you could ask for, including a good dose of humour sprinkled throughout.
The entire book is printed in color, with GPS-based maps, elevation profiles and plenty of great photos. Hiking etiquette and safety info are also included.
Enough can't be said about this book. If you're looking to summit any of the glorious North Shore summits (or even if you just want to learn more about their histories for that matter), this book is a very worthwhile investment."