Dreaming of tramping the hills
Coast Mountain High Routes: A guide to 46 high route and alpine traverses in the Coast Mountains
by John Baldwin
Vancouver: John Baldwin, 2025
$59.00 / 9780991947966
Reviewed by Glenn Woodsworth
*
Vancouver mountaineer John Baldwin has been exploring the Coast Mountains of western British Columbia for over 40 years. Without question he is the most knowledgeable person alive on that part of these mountains south of Bella Coola. Unlike many mountaineers, he is less interested in bagging peaks than in exploration. He particularly loves off-trail hikes through high country, particularly seldom-visited high country. These travels have led to his previous books, Exploring the Coast Mountains on Skis, and two books of photographs, most recently, with Linda Bily, Soul of Wilderness: Mountain Journeys in Western BC and Alaska.
Coast Mountain High Routes describes 46 summertime routes and alpine traverses in southwestern BC. From Vancouver and Manning Park to the Bella Coola Valley, with a couple of routes father north. Routes take from 3 to 22 days to complete, with about a quarter of them taking longer than two weeks. Well known high routes elsewhere in the world include Steve Roper’s Sierra High Route in the Sierra Nevada, the Pacific Crest Trail in the North Cascades of Washington, the Wapta traverse in the Canadian Rockies, and the famous Haute Route in the French and Swiss Alps. All these high routes, including those in this book, are multi-day treks, mostly or entirely above timberline. The high routes in Baldwin’s book, aside from a few close to populated areas in BC’s Lower Mainland, have few or no trails, no huts, no cell service, and, in many cases, no easy exit if something goes wrong or the weather turns wretched. Most are wilderness routes, not meant for novices: you are on your own.
The trips described in this book are presented as they are for summertime, although some are excellent in the winter, given good conditions. Baldwin has excluded routes on the big icefields such as the Homathko and Monarch icefields and routes that involve serious mountaineering.
This book, in a way, is a cross between a conventional guidebook and a photo book. Most hiking and climbing guidebooks give quite detailed information on the route, how to get to the start, and so forth. This book doesn’t do any of this hand-holding. Descriptions are minimal: a few sentences on approach, type of terrain, difficulties, and brief mention of any special gear needed, such as rope, ice axe, and crampons. The minimal descriptions preserve the wilderness and exploratory nature of these trips and might help weed out those not prepared for this sort of travel. The brief but excellent instruction covers route planning (strong wilderness navigation skills are essential, especially in bad weather), difficulty ratings, access, weather, bears, food caches, and glacier travel.
I was surprised to see only one map, an overview map showing the rough locations of all the trips. Rather than maps for each trip, Baldwin provides a link to a detailed digital Google Earth map that shows all routes. Although highly useful, Baldwin notes that this is no substitute for proper topographic maps.
This big book (8”x10”, 296 pages) is illustrated with an astonishing 325 colour photos, almost all a full half page in size. Some of these have appeared in Soul of Wilderness, but most have not been previously published. For each route these photos give an idea of the terrain encountered on the route and the scenery along the way; the photos alone are worth the price of the book. (Most of the photos were taken on fine, clear days; those unfamiliar with the region might be excused for thinking that this is the standard summer weather in this area. In some seasons, poor to foul weather is more common, but that doesn’t work as well for photography.)
I am not sure what the intended audience is for this book. Most of the southernmost traverses are done occasionally and for those interested in doing them the book will be very useful and might even encourage them to consider areas farther north. But for most of the popular trips, there are plenty of reports and other information available online to supplement descriptions here. On the other hand, many of the more remote trips described have never been repeated. For people interested in these journeys, perhaps 20 individuals at most in any given year, this book will be an essential starting point for their research. Perhaps the biggest market for this book will be people who just want to read about the region and visit it vicariously. These people will be well rewarded by this book, and ultimately it may be these dreamers who get the most value from it. Perhaps the best way to study this book is to spread paper maps out on your living room floor and then pore over them in detail to really get a feel for the topography.
Aside from books on the Lower Mainland and Don Serl’s definitive guide to the Mount Waddington area, there has been little written about most of the Coast Mountains in this region. This book is authoritative, superbly researched, organized, and written. It is a welcome addition to the handful of books on this region of the Coast Mountains.
*
Glenn Woodsworth has been exploring the western B.C. wilderness for over 55 years. He has climbed, explored, and mapped extensively in the Coast Mountains, where he has many first ascents to his credit. He is a past president and honorary member of the B.C. Mountaineering Club and for some years was a member of the Geographical Names Board of Canada. A geologist by profession, Glenn is an emeritus research scientist with the Geological Survey of Canada, where he worked mainly on deciphering the geological history of western British Columbia. He has written, edited, and contributed to several outdoor guides, including Hot Springs of Western Canada, written with his son, David Woodsworth. With his wife, Joy, he operates Tricouni Press, which has published books on a variety of B.C.-related subjects. [Editor’s Note: A fourth edition of Hot Springs of Western Canada: A Complete Guide (4th edition) was published in 2023, and reviewed here. Glenn Woodsworth has reviewed books by David Crerar, Harry Crerar, and Bill Maurer and Stephen Hui for The British Columbia Review.]