BOOK REVIEW - Jerry Haven

Mountaineer's Guide to the High Sierra, edited by Hervey H. Voge and Andrew J. Smatko. Sierra Club, 360 pages, $7.95

Although not many people have been aware of it, I have been book review editor for the DPS Newsletter for the last two years. Therefore, when he received a complimentary copy of the Mountaineer's Guide to the High Sierra, editor John Vitz asked me to review it. (Since I had already ordered a copy, John kept the free one for himself.)

Frankly, I cannot imagine why the DPS Newsletter was sent this book. It has absolutely nothing to do with the desert or its peaks. Instead, it dwells in almost pathological detail with the Sierra Nevada, a central California mountain range which does not have even a single peak on the DPS list. Apparently, it is an updated version of the Climber's Guide, an earlier work dealing with the same range. Unlike the Climber's Guide, the new book confines itself to non-technical routes (class 4 and lower), with a second volume planned for technical climbs. Certainly, for most desert peakers, this is not a great loss. The Mountaineer's Guide does contain peaks and routes not found in the previous guide. For example, it mentions, but does not identify, the little known Haven McQuillan route up the western chute of Peak 13385 (page 167). In addition, many errors and omissions in the old book have been corrected. For instance, just this September I verified that indeed there is no class 2 route to the true summit of Polemonium Peak.

If this book has a fault, outside of the restricted subject matter, it is that it is too thorough, wasting a lot of space (and weight) on un-named bumps, all of which seem to be class 1 up the (pick a direction) slopes. But that is a small complaint, and I am sure that the DPS-ers who spend their summers slumming in the High Sierra will want a copy of this book. However, for information about the desert, one would do just as well at the public library leafing through back issues of the Ladies' Home Journal.

NEWS

GLEN CANYON NRA BILL NEEDS HELP
The house bill on Glen Canyon National Recreation Area (H.R. 15716), which includes the proposed Escalante Wilderness, has been amended in committee to add wilderness study, to add some acreage, to delete the section on private development inside the NRA boundary, and to extend the road study from one to two years. However, amendments to add the upper Escalante area and to revise the rigidly-worded section on roads, which specifically authorizes a road across the lower Escalante and fixes the location within several miles of Stevens Arch, failed. Letters should be sent to your congressman asking his support for an amendment on the House floor to delete the restrictive language in Section 8 and substitute a broad study of road needs in the entire region.

BAD NEWS

THE SIERRA STRIKES AGAIN
Two weeks ago, while climbing Temple Crag in the Palisades region, Mary Riseley fell and seriously injured herself. After many hours on the mountain she was airlifted to Bishop and she is now recovering in a southland hospital. Both the sympathy and the best wishes of the DPS are extended to Mary, as well as to husband Frank, children Mike and Joni, and the rest of her family.
 
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