Top Trails: Northern California's Redwood Coast: Must-Do Hikes for Everyone

This summer will be my first in the last five that I do not go to visit the Redwood Coast. I've promised to take my wife to Pennsylvania and plan to hike along the AT during my time outside the confines of the classroom I teach in. But having just finished Mike White's latest book, "Top Trails (of) Northern California's Redwood Coast," I'm already regretting the decision. California's redwoods offer the most beautiful, peaceful, and pleasant hiking in the entire state. The trails in this book are described as "must do" hikes, and indeed, I've done the vast majority (nearly 75%) the routes described here. And yet, once bitten,... well, let's just say many of these have been done more than once, and this despite the fact that I live over 500 miles from the parks and preserves described in this book.Most of these hikes are really strolls. Redwoods grow well along flat river bottoms, and this makes for lots of level flood plain walks, many of which are under a mile in length. But even those which are close to highway 101 seem far removed. The trees and undergrowth dampen the sounds of the cars, many of which include drivers who slow down considerably when they see the Redwood forest along either side of the asphalt. White's book begins the Redwood Coast in Mendocino county, with trails among Big Hendy Grove and the Mendocino reserve. The book is organized south to north with Redwood trails intermixed with coastal walks and a few prairie and overland routes. Only one of the routes described here, Redwood Creek, exceeds 10 miles, and even it is less strenuous than its length implies. All of the trails in the book can be done as day hikes. and none are truly strenuous. I also appreciate the author including some lesser known parks in his book: Patrick's Point and Humbolt Lagoons are also worthy of exploration if you have more than a few days in Redwood country.Top Trails books are far more carefully organized than most hiking guides. Icons provide a quick overview of a hike, as do short descriptive "hike at a glance" pages at the start of each chapter. Once you locate a hike that suits your ability and predisposition for the day, accessing the longer route description is fairly easy. But generally speaking, Top Trails books tend to be just exerpts from longer hiking guides, repackaged into a large pocketbook format. This volume is very much an exception to the rule. It is truly a listing of the best hikes in the region. The publisher describes these as "must do" trails. Having spent parts of many summers (and winters and springs) in the Redwoods, I have to add, you must do these multiple times. This is simply the best peaceful walking in the Golden State.

This was a last-minute impulse purchase for a week long trip my husband and I took to see the "Big Trees" to celebrate our 40th anniversary (that will give you a small clue as to our ages). It was the best thing I could have done to insure the success and enjoyment of our trip! We stayed several days in the Mendocino area and, using the guide, chose hikes in nearby state parks. Then we traveled north and stayed another few days in Arcada and, using the guide, hiked in the Redwood State and National Parks. The guide is very precise in describing the trails, their level of difficulty, and estimated time to hike them. I would highly recommend this guide book to anyone who is going to visit the northern California coast area and is planning to hike trails.

Really helpful in planning for our trip to the Redwoods. It has a map for each trail. Breaks up the trails into sections depending on were they are located at. So the sections include: Mendocin, Kings Range & Sinkyone, Humboldt, Redwood National Park & Vicinity, Prairie Creek, Del Norte Coast Redwoods, Jedediah Smith Redwoods. The book also has a trail legend for all the trails in the books, that has information on trail difficulty, length in miles, type of trail, whether its dayhiking, or for backpacking, terrain, what features you might see, and if trail is kid friendly, to name a few. All in all I'd recommend for trip planning, another great resource is an app called All trails

This is a good book, and I like the way it is organized. We used it a lot when we went to northern California, and it was very helpful and quite accurate. I checked it against a website about redwood hikes, and used correlated good reports to select our hiking agenda. When we got to northern California, it was very important to have the book, as internet service was intermittent. We took it everywhere. It wasn't perfect (we got a bit lost on one hike, Founders' Grove, I believe it was; it wasn't far from some main roads, so we were able to reorient ourselves based on where the roads were), but it was very helpful overall. Good purchase.

Used it for hiking in the Redwood parks of northern CA. The descriptions were detailed and the maps were accurate. It helped us plan our trip ahead of time. We kept referring to it even after arriving st the park and having received park’s maps and the ranger’s advice.

love the descriptions and tips - managed a few of the trails on our recent redwoods trip, but did notice that there were a lot of park trails that were NOT listed in the book when we were in the area.

Very helpful

It covers the coast from Oregon down to Mendocino and Wine Country, just like I wanted. The map I bought stops at Trinidad so it only covers half of what I need.