Top Trails: Maui: Must-Do Hikes for Everyone Paperback – February 1, 2011

When high surf limited our usual scuba diving excursions, we turned to more land-based activities. This book "drove" our daily outings and encouraged us to explore areas of Maui that we'd bypassed on 3 previous trips to the island. Detailed descriptions of hikes really helped us prepare for each. (In fact, I found myself advising others at trailheads.)

This is a great guidebook for Maui hikes. Leave the superfluous info about hotels, things to do, etc. to other books: this one helps you focus on getting on the trails and walking through nature! This was one of my top resources on my last trip, and I'm glad I had it with me.

Maps could have been better illustrated. Basic book,

Loaded with lots of hikes and all levels. Good resource for visiting maui.

Nice book. A bit dated in a few places, but the best of it's kind that I've seen. Be aware that maui is a challenging place to hike and you probably didn't pack the right gear for high altitude, or remote hikes here. Be careful out there....

My wife and I love hiking, and was hoping to get a little more information about the hikes available in Maui. We had previously purchased "Maui Revealed", and would recommend buying that book over this. "Top Trails: Maui" has a lot more information about each of the hikes than "Maui Revealed", but it was missing a couple of the recommended hikes from "Maui Revealed". Also, I was also a little put off by the Haleakala section because a good chunk of the material was just rehashed from the other sections. For example, much of the text for "Halamauu Trail to Holua", "Halamauu Trail to Silversword Loop", and "Halamauu Trail to Paliku" each share the same 2-3 pages. Is it really necessary to repeat all that information? Couldn't the author just say -- "Starting from Point X, continue to Point Y for the Silversword Loop".My other complaint about this book is that it really focuses on what each trail is and how to get to it, and really doesn't make any judgement about whether or not it's a worthwhile trip. We have limited time on the island, and it would be nice if the author would give us an indication of what they deem to be "must see", or at least something like. For me, the author doesn't even do a good enough job of describing each trail and what it offers to the point that you'd be able to determine if the hike is something that you'd be interested in. I found myself reading the book, and then searching for the hikes described to see what others online thought of them. In comparison, the author of "Maui Revealed" does a great job of describing the hikes to a point that I'd be able to make a determination if the hike is worthwhile.If I could rate this book 2.5 stars, I would. I found the information describing how to access the trailheads and the milestone information very useful (but all this information is easily available online), but I just didn't feel like this book did a good enough job describing what to expect and if it's something that I should spend my precious time doing. The author is someone that has visited each of these trails (whereas online reviewers usually only hit 1 or 2 trails on their trip -- so unless they have a poor experience, they are more likely to rate it higher, they are in Hawaii afterall), and is the most qualified to let us know if their worth our time, but sadly chooses to skip this opportunity.

Mahalo.

Great book with up to date information