Books – Hiking Trail Guides

This post will describe the best hiking trail guides that I have found for Acadia National Park in Maine, for the rest of the state of Maine, and for the White Mountains in New Hampshire.  If the hike I write about is listed in one of these guides I will include an Amazon link to the book at the end of the hike’s description.  I already included links to two of these books at the end of the first two hiking posts. 

The three books are A Walk in the Park: Acadia’s Hiking Guide by Tom St. Germain, the Appalachian Mountain Club [AMC] Maine Mountain Guide, and the AMC White Mountain Guide.

A Walk in the Park: Acadia’s Hiking Guide by Tom St. Germain

This book is currently in its Tenth Edition.  It describes every single official trail there is on Mount Desert Island, where the majority of Acadia National Park is located.  It even includes trails on the island that are not contained within the park boundaries.  It does not, however, include trails for the sections of Acadia National Park located on Isle au Haut or the Schoodic Peninsula.

The author hikes every trail each year, so he has an intimate knowledge of them.  This is not someone who visited for a couple weeks, walked the most common trails, and then did a book.  This is as complete and accurate as it can be.

The book is well laid out in five sections, three for the eastern part of the island and two for the western.  Each section has a two page summary, with the name of the trail, where to park, and the difficulty rating on the first page, and a map of the entire section on the second page.  The two pages face each other so you do not have to flip back and forth.

For each trail in the section there are also two pages.  The first page has a detailed description of the hike.  The second page has a detailed map of the trail, a graph showing elevation changes, and it lists the high and low points, the net elevation change, the difficulty level, the technical challenge, and, of course, the length.  Like the section summary, these pages are also set facing each other. 

Even the book itself is physically designed to help the hiker.  It is shaped so that it can easily slip into a back pocket when you do not need it.  It also contains a flap that functions as an attached bookmark to hold the page describing the hike you are doing.

I’ve seen many other guides for sale, but if you ask any of the people on Mount Desert Island, and I have, this is hands down the best guide for the hiking trails there.

AMC Maine Mountain Guide

This book is currently in its Ninth Edition.  It covers all of the state of Maine, except for the trails contained in Acadia National Park and a few in the White Mountain National Forest.  Combine this book with the Acadia Guide described above and you have as complete a list of trails as can be had.

This book breaks the state up into twelve sections.  For each section they recommend hikes for three different difficulty levels, Easy, Moderate, and Strenuous.  They have a table of contents for the section that lists the mountains, the trails on them, and what page the trail descriptions are on.  The trail descriptions, and even the sections, are not laid out in any logical pattern, so you will need to reference the index and the tables of contents when you want to find a trail.

The book also includes guides for trip planning, safety, and landowner rights.  There are Appendices listing the 100 highest peaks in New England, as well as a checklist of all the 4,000 footers in New England.  Finally, the book also has eight different maps of the major trails described in the book.  The maps are printed in color, contain topographical info, and fold up so small they can fit in a wallet.

The biggest flaw with this guide is that while the trail descriptions do include distance and expected time to hike, and they do include the elevations of the mountains at their peaks, they do not include elevations or elevation changes for the trail itself.  You will need to consult a topographical map to find out if the hike climbs 500 feet or 2,500. 

One other note:  There are trails in Evan’s Notch in Maine that are located in the part of the White Mountain National Forest that extends into Maine (i.e. East Royce.)  The descriptions for those trails are not contained in the Maine Mountain Guide.  They are in the White Mountain Guide.

AMC White Mountain Guide

This book is currently in its Twenty-eighth Edition.  It covers all of the trails in the White Mountain National Forest, which is mostly located in the state of New Hampshire.  A small piece of the national forest extends into Maine and the trails located there are also described in this book.

This book breaks the national forest up into twelve sections.  For each section they recommend hikes for three different difficulty levels, Easy, Moderate, and Strenuous.  Unlike the Maine Mountain Guide, they put these recommendations at the end of the section, rather than the beginning, making them a little harder to find.  Like the Maine Mountain Guide, the trail descriptions, and even the sections, are not laid out in any logical pattern, so you will need to reference the index and the tables of contents when you want to find a trail.

The book also includes guides for trip planning, safety, and landowner rights.  There are Appendices listing the 100 highest peaks in New England, as well as a checklist of all the 4,000 footers in New England.  Finally, the book also has six different maps of all the trails described in the book.  The maps are printed in color, contain topographical info, and fold up very small.  Because of the number of trails, they are thicker than the maps in the Maine Mountain Guide.  Fitting them in a wallet could be difficult.

Unlike the Maine Mountain Guide, the descriptions in this book do include the elevation changes you will encounter on each and every trail.

         Acadia              Maine Mountains    White Mountains