New Book

PhotoTripUSA Publishing recently released Greg Vaughn's new book, "Photographing Washington, A guide to the natural landmarks of The Evergreen State", found here, which has a chapter on Mt. Rainier NP. It is an excellent book for the photographer visiting the state and wants an overview of the expanse of photographic opportunities.

I only glanced over the book to focus on the introduction and the chapter on Mt. Rainier NP, but I can say based on the sections I did read with familarity with the places he does a good job giving the places photographers want to see and photograph.

With respect to Mt. Rainier NP the book focusing on the common places, mostly the easy accessible visitors areas and stops with descriptions of the most common trails to what most people photograh in the NP, scenic landscapes and the obvious wildflowers.

The chapter is divided into 15 sections, but really 14 since on is on the Wonderland Trail which itself is the subject of several books, two excellent recent ones, not mentioned in this book. The chapter pretty much follows the roads in the NP with the northwest area.

The chapter starts with the Nisqually Entrance to Paradise, then proceeds along the Stevens Canyon Road to the eastside north-south highway (123-410) and then describes to places along on that highway to the White River Road to Sunrise to the Yakima Park area.

The chapter then describes the Carbon River and the Spray Park - Mowich Lake areas before adding a section on two west side opportunities, Gobbler's Knob (lookout) off the Westside Road and the Glacier view vista on the adjacent wilderness area south of the NP.

The chapter's real focus is really focus are those two interests, scenic views and wildflowers with good descriptions of when and where including trailheads and trails. The shortcomings of the chapter are the obvious details, which is expected since it's only 30+ pages with photos.

It also lacks what I would consider the obvious maps, but then the author mentioned the on-line and print resources for these, two of which I highly recommend two maps on the NP by Tom Haseltine, the south side and the north side which provide better descriptions.

But in the end the chapter is a great place for the first time or occasional visitor or photographer to the NP.