Hiking South Carolina Trails: Hikes Along the Chatanooga Trail, Cowpens Battlefield Trail, Old Walled City Trail, Table Rock Trail, and Many Others

I've had some bad experiences with other books in this series, so I opened this book somewhat afraid of what I might find. Fortunately, this guide was not the disaster I had feared. This guide describes a large number of trails (too many to count; I would guess 300-400) all over South Carolina. Distance and difficulty range from flat, paved 0.3 mile trails in small city parks to difficult 10+ mile hikes in the Mountain Bridge Wilderness Area. De Hart deserves credit for devoting many pages to trails in lesser-known destinations such as county parks, university-run preserves, and private-run preserves. While information about national forest and state park trails is readily available online, trail guides such as this one are needed to help hikers find the lesser-known, but no less rewarding, trails. Since De Hart is one of the best trail authors available, it comes as no surprise that most of the trail descriptions are excellent. Unfortunately, as a previous reviewer has noted, the same cannot be said for the maps. A few of the major trails (Foothills Trail, Swamp Fox Trail, etc.) have nice maps including contours, but most of the trails have no maps at all. Indeed, it is hard to follow even the best written trail description without some sort of map. This is the main weakness of this guide and the main reason I have docked it one star. In summary, if you plan to buy only one guide to South Carolina hiking, this would NOT be the one; for that, I would recommend either "Hiking South Carolina" by Clark and Dantzler or the new "50 Hikes in South Carolina" by Johnny Molloy. However, those two guides focus mainly on state park and national forest trails. Thus, if you want a more comprehensive guide that includes many lesser-known destinations, then this guide deserves your consideration.

Everyone who lives in South Carolina (walker or not) should have this book for its wealth of historical anecdote. De Hart describes over 200 trails in the Palmetto State giving directions to each trail, the trail's length, walking time, and difficulty (similar to volksmarching ratings). He includes commentary on the area's history and animal and plant life. You will find plenty of illustrations and maps plus an appendix full of useful contacts. "Hiking South Carolina Trails" is indispensable for South Carolinians and worthwhile to visitors.