Go Hiking in North Carolina or Virginia! Randy Johnson in Nevada's Spring Mountains Welcome! If you’re hiking in North Carolina, Virginia, or Tennessee, please consider one of my guides. 2010 is the 75th Anniversary of the Blue Ridge Parkway and both of my bestselling Parkway trail guides—"Hiking the Blue Ridge Parkway" and "Best Easy Day Hikes Blue Ridge Parkway"—are just out in new and improved 2010 2nd editions. The first editions earned 4+ to 5-star reviews from readers—and the 2nd editions have just gotten better. I also hope you'll like my other new book, "Best Easy Day Hikes Great Smoky Mountains National Park." This is one of only four books in the nationally popular "Best Easy" series being bundled with a National Geographic Trails Illustrated map (of the Great Smokies, of course, at a great price!). "Hiking North Carolina," one of the nation’s bestselling trail guides, is also out in a new 2010 printing that includes many updates as it spans the state. Hike Roan Mountain, NC in the summer. My Books My goal is to write guide books that engage readers as much as the articles I publish in national magazines and newspapers (some have won awards from the Society of American Travel Writers and North American Travel Journalists Association). As a longtime photojournalist, I know photos impart a true sense of place, and most of my books include a lot. My pictures have appeared in Backpacker and Outside. I've photographed European ski areas for SKI Magazine and had full-page photo spreads in USA Today. And I'm a bona-fide map fanatic. My books have plentiful, accurate maps. My trail descriptions explain why a place excites me--including history, ecology, climate, and culture. I often explore an entire area, and recommend a range of hikes. Trail managing agencies have formalized hikes recommended in my books--perhaps because I'm a trail professional myself. I founded the trail program at Grandfather Mountain, designed and built new trails, and orchestrated backcountry research that helped Grandfather Mountain become the world's only privately-owned Biosphere Reserve. During the completion of the Blue Ridge Parkway at Grandfather, I helped create the trail network that's in place today. Learn to Cross Country Ski with Randy Johnson. See more videos. The mountain’s backcountry is a new state park. Check out my Grandfather Mountain page for features on the rich history of the mountain and its trails. The trail work I do now is volunteer, but I confess, writing books that help people find outdoor adventure feels a lot like the satisfaction I gained designing and building trails, or just advising hikers I met in the backcountry on how to get the most out of the mountain. I hope that same passion to share the outdoors comes through in my books. Along the way I've been a founding editor of The Mountain Times in Boone, mountain columnist for The Charlotte Observer, and until 2009, the longtime editor-in-chief of United Hemispheres, the United States most award-winning inflight magazine (named "World's Best inflight" in 2006). Today, I'm expanding my list of books. Expect a new revision of "Southern Snow: The Winter Guide to Dixie" (it's been called a "cult classic"). Please troll around my Web site to see a lot of new video features, read my published articles, or see a list of book signings and trail presentations. I hope you'll consider my guides. Here's wishing you the kind of hiking experiences that inspire me to write them!

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