50 Hikes in the Mountains of North Carolina: Walks and Hikes from the Blue Ridge Mountains to the Great Smokies, Second Edition

Rating:
Summary: Good, just less full coverage than title might indicate
Review: This is a very good guide to the hikes that it covers. All 50 hikes are rated and include a range of difficulties from easy to strenuous. Many are in some of the most beautiful parts of the North Carolina mountains. And topographic maps help show the routes well and clarify what one shoule expect. A chief drawback (only hinted at in the low-key extended part of the title after the colon), is that it is less than a comprehensive guide to North Carolina mountain trails. It covers nothing west of the central part of Great Smoky Mountains National Park or west of the Cashiers area to the south thereof. North Carolina extends more than a hundred miles west of those areas, and there are plenty more mountains that way. So if that western extremity of the state is where you're wanting to explore, this is not the guide for that. But for mountains to the east thereof, this book should serve you well. One irony is that, although omitting that vast area of westernmost North Carolina, it does have a
"Foothills" section that includes at least three hikes properly described as in the Piedmont, hardly foothills at all. Those are at Reed Gold Mine and Duke Power State Park (as the book still calls it). They can be pleasant and rewarding hikes, but if you go there expecting mountain or foothill vistas, you could be disappointed. By the way, Duke Power State Park has since been renamed Lake Norman State Park. You'll need to know that if you look for signs directing you there (like from Interstate 77).