[daffish]

Black Mtn (east)

Scullcap Peak

Portal Peak

After many years of sketching some of the peaks I have scrambled, I found myself with quite a collection of sketch maps. Many of you have seen these sketches posted in various reports and have shown interest by asking where I got them or what book they came from. Now, finally, after much procrastination, I have collated my drawings into a coherent body of work and can offer them in an organized format. These maps cover the Mountain Loop area and there are 83 sketches from within the region (it is not an exhaustive collection as there are many more peaks in the area).

Book Cover

Rambling and Scrambling Sketch Book I formatted the book through ‘CreateSpace’ a POD (print on demand) publisher and also an affiliate of Amazon. It has been a rather long and interesting learning experience with the end result being a reasonably affordable product. Thanks for looking at the book. Dave Fish P.S. If you decide to purchase a book, you can use the Amazon link at the top of the site (a Shop) and some of Amazon’s profits will go to NWHikers. Search for ‘rambling and scrambling’.

[dicey]

I know a couple of people who have this book and I'm tempted to buy my own copy. A great collection of Mountain Loop scrambles, and really nice drawings

[Magellan]

I am all over this! Thanks for doing it!

[b00]

awesome book! :>)

[RichP]

I'm getting one!

[puzzlr]

I hope you get a large % of the price Amazon charges. I just purchased one. You do great work -- how about traveling south and doing some sketches in the Middle Fork? Garfield is an amazing mountain - different from every direction.

[Schryder]

Ordered one, looks very cool! Congrats.

[zephyr]

Awesome, daffish. Your sketch of The Eaglet convinced me to go up there this spring. Great work! ~z

[Riverside Laker]

This is a fabulous book. Thumbs up for making this available!

[ree]

We are getting some extra copies to give to friends. Makes a great gift for a hiker or lover of the Cascades. There are some ideas for some great hiking destinations too. Dave is very knowledgeable about the mountain loop area. Well done, Dave.

[aywolfpac]

Very cool. I have seen a few of these drawing on trip reports and the like and never realized they were yours.

[contour5]

These are great! I mean really, really well done. I hope you keep doing these, and add more sections over time. A tiny, whiney request for future editions: Color coded trails, bootpaths, THs, etc, for us old geezers with fading eyesight. Black on black confuses my aging optical input sensors. Beautiful Work!

[daffish]

Thanks for all the kind words. I think I started doing these sketches in the mid 1990’s. The concept started in part to make them easily reproducible on a copy machine. The original sketches are inked on an 11 x 17 sheet of paper and reduced down to 8.5 x 11. My first attempt at sharing was a spiral bound collection that I had printed in (I think) 2002 and distributed out to friends. I think that is what Dicey is referring to in her post. But that collection only has about half as many sketches as this new edition. I still kept doing new sketches with a somewhat dim idea of making a formal book. Last year, when I read fellow NWHiker rhughes blog on self publishing (here), I knew the time had come to get my act together (Thanks Roy). The fact that I stayed with my original format has enabled me to have the book printed entirely in black and white and thusly has kept the price down significantly. If there was any color whatsoever in the book, the price would jump to about twice as much. And of course there has been a slow evolution in the sketches themselves. Some are better than others from both an artistic viewpoint and an informational standard. Hope you all enjoy the book and can derive as much pleasure and adventure scrambling the mountains as I have.

[popzeus]

These are absolutely beautiful. I just ordered my copy, can't wait till it arrives.

[rhughes]

Congratulations Dave on publishing your book. I've just ordered my copy through the NWHikers Amazon link. It's always great to see a local writer/artist get his or her work into print. And it's a great thrill for the author to finally do it. I would encourage those of you who "have a book in you" to consider writing and publishing it. It is a bit of a rocky road but the process has improved tremendously over the past few years. Don't think that you'll make a ton of money from it, because you most likely won't, but it is a great experience. What Dave said about printing in color is true. My book, North Cascades Beautiful, had to be priced fairly high for me to even make a few bucks per book. To add color to his book Dave might have to price it out of the market to break even. I've been looking into creating an ebook in color which could be priced much lower but that medium is fraught with problems at the moment as well. It is not a simple conversion for a book of text and images to be converted to a Kindle-type format. Besides, I see Dave's book as much a work of art as it is a hiker's reference and black and white works just fine for that, I believe. The beauty of a book like Dave's is not just that you can view the trails and elevation for a particular area but that you can look at these map sketches and re-live the times that you've trekked over these areas. His is a book that just keeps on giving. I can't wait for my copy to arrive.