The Glorious Mountains of Vancouver’s North Shore – A Peakbagger’s Guide

David Crerar, Harry Crerar and Bill Mauer Rocky Mountain Books

It’s easy to become cynical about guidebooks. Although I rather doubt that Fred Beckey said, “Write it, and they will come,” there’s little doubt that as soon as a guidebook is published, there are climbers with their yellow highlighters out, calculating in their personal calendars the number of routes they wish to climb divided by how many long weekends there might be between their current age and, say, age 60. And there’s the fact that once your favourite crag is discovered, well, there goes the Golden Age.

The Glorious Mountains of Vancouver’s North Shore – A Peakbagger’s Guide is certainly an audacious title. When was the last time you saw, oh, “Brilliant Summits of the High Sierra” or “The Gleaming Giants of the Front Ranges”?

This 500-page tome is too pretty and too heavy to easily tuck in your rucksack, and you would not want grease smears marring the photos or maps. The key is in the subtitle, “A Peak Bagger’s Guide.” Most hikers and climbers can identify Mount Seymour, Grouse Mountain and the Lions (extra points for Hollyburn and Strachan). But dozens of obscure peaks, some of whose names are lost to history, are possible to summit via existing climbing trails or bushwhacking. Whether the effort is worth it or not is another question.

Why bother? Well for one thing, the views are worth it. Standing on Mount Artaban (Gambier Island), Leading Peak (Anvil Island) and Mount Gardner (Bowen Island), the drama of the Cascades, Coast Range and Ring of Fire unfolds from Mount Rainier in Washington state north to heart of Garibaldi Park.

There’s nothing of interest to the multi-pitch climber, but these peaks are not walking around Stanley Park, either. Even in the Coast Range, some trails are bereft of water in the heat of the summer and cell service – which has most certainly been a life saver for calling search and rescue teams – is not always a given. Trails disappear, swollen creeks forded, and rocks can be kicked down on some of the chossier routes.

Portions from the sale of The Glorious Mountains of Vancouver’s North Shore go will support the work of local search and rescue teams.—Steven Threndyle