To the Top - Reaching for America's 50 State Summits (Hardcover, illustrated edition)

Seeking to climb to the geographic highpoints of all 50 U.S. states has been a recognized passion of a select few adventurous souls since 1986, when some of these folks discovered one another and began calling themselves the High Pointers Club. But a completed 50-state quest has never before been documented in book form. To the Top, a new book by adventurer Joe Glickman and his friend, renowned outdoor photographer Nels Akerlund, is an engaging, lighthearted account of two close friends accomplishing this new American odyssey.

Their adventure began in 1994, when Joe and Nels, over glasses of beer, hatched a plan to climb America's 50 state summits while documenting the expedition. Expecting the exercise to take six months, Joe and Nels found themselves embarking on a five-year marathon that included not only the physical challenges of scaling imposing peaks like Wyoming's Gannett Peak and Alaska's Mt. Denali, but the artistic challenge of documenting the highpoints in states like Nebraska, where the highpoint, quite literally, was a mound of cow dung on a prairie stretching as far as the eye can see.

The real adventure for readers, though, is in eavesdropping on the good-natured, back-and-forth banter of two good friends fulfilling a lifelong dream -- and in meeting the Americans Joe and Nels encounter along the way: eccentric fellow travelers and off-beat local characters; isolated hermits and thrill-seeking adventurers; forest rangers and fellow highpointers.