Early Days in the Range of Light: Encounters with Legendary Mountaineers

It's 1873.

Gore-Tex shells and aluminum climbing gear are a century away, but the high mountains still demand your attention. Imagine the stone in your hands and thousands of feet of open air below you, with only a wool jacket to weather a storm and no rope to catch a fall. Daniel Arnold did more than imagine — he spent three years retracing the steps of his climbing forefathers and, in Early Days in the Range of Light, he tells their riveting stories.

From 1864 to 1931, the Sierra Nevadas witnessed some of the most audacious climbing of all time. In the spirit of his predecessors, Arnold carried only rudimentary equipment — no ropes, no harness, no specialized climbing shoes. Sometimes he left his backpack and sleeping bag behind as well and, like John Muir, traveled for days with only a few pounds of food rolled into a sack slung over his shoulder.

In an artful blend of history, biography, nature, and adventure writing, Arnold brings to life the journeys and the terrain traveled. In the process he uncovers the motivations that drove an extraordinary group of individuals to risk so much for airy summits and close contact with bare stone and snow.

"This well-written combination of history, memoir and travelogue should find a welcome home in many climbing collections." Kirkus Reviews

"Fans of mountaineering books, especially those whose climbing isn't confined to the armchair, will love this beautifully written journey back through time." Booklist

"This is a splendid chronicle of early climbing in the Sierra Nevada." Royal Robbins

"This 'book' is really a Technicolor time machine to the earliest explorations of American high peaks." Peter Croft

Portland, Oregon native Arnold began climbing the Pacific Rim volcanoes as a teenager and has since scaled peaks throughout North and South America. He spent much of the past decade researching the early mountaineers of California's Sierra Nevada mountains--dubbed "The Range of Light" by John Muir--and retracing their footsteps, using the same equipment and techniques as they would have used. Arnold combines history, biography, nature, and adventure writing in a fascinating account of 15 climbs originally conducted between 1864 and 1931, and describes his own recent climbing experiences along those same routes. Illustrated with b&w photographs. No subject index. Annotation ©2010 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

At 15, Daniel Arnold began climbing the Pacific Rim volcanoes and local basalt crags of his native Portland and went on to climb throughout North and South America. He lives in Southern California, and Early Days in the Range of Light is his first book.