I am currently making additions, corrections, and some major changes to the guide. It was a good start to see all the places that I would error but now its time to fix it and update it correctly!

Here are a few of the major changes currently going into action.

1. Redesign, I am not spending all my time on it but it will look a bit different and I am also going to be spending the extra money to gloss each page which makes it more resistant to water. I have found that its not that great against it as it is now!

2. Puriton will be changed to Purinton.

3. Contact Information will be added for Emergencies, Rescue and all that jazz.

4. Where to stay will be enlarged with more information.

5. Some of the uglier Fonts will go.

6. Many route names have been added by information that came in from others.

7. The Seward Highway will be included in the book more. More crags from the highway will be added, I decided to keep it condensed and try to make the one better instead of working on another book. So it will get bigger.

8. The Title will be changed to something of the effect "Alaska Rock Climbing Guide : SouthCentral" Unless I can get some of the climbing areas I have my sights on this summer to expand its areas.

9. Tabs will be added to the side pages so that it will be easier to quickly flip to a climbing area.

If you have any ideas, I MEAN ANY AT ALL! Then please voice them. This is the time. Lets just forget any arguments or anonymity that was before and start a new.

Kelsey, a one-paragraph excerpt from your guidebook was featured in Sunday's Anchorage Daily News. In that one paragraph were something like three or four spelling errors. While probably not crucial to the guide, such errors could prevent your work from being viewed as professional. You might try proofreading it or giving it to another person to proof read thoroughly.

Just trying to be constructive, not harsh....

No you are completely right! I had one person who is a freelance editor read it as well as myself but it needs more work then that and I will be giving it to multiple people this time to help clear up a lot more of those errors. Thanks!

I wrote all of my wife's term papers in nursing school, and used to write/edit people's papers in high school and college for money (cheating I know, but I had to eat and buy climbing gear!). Send me a draft copy and I'll edit it for free. All I ask is a copy of the finished book when it comes out.

Thanks Micah, I'll keep ya in mind

You might try a pen name of some sort to put on the cover that holds some prestige, or maybe is more "local sounding" if you know what I mean...

Oh, and more pictures! As many awesome pictures from everybody as you can possibly cram in.

The obvious "more and better information" that you're working on already is the biggest detriment to the quality of the current book. Really I think the next version with more route names and info (keep the FAs in there) and more areas and routes in general would be great.

Take your time though and make it awesome and complete, I really don't want to have to buy a new guidebook every single year! The Yangshuo China guidebook is on version 8.5 after some fifteen years worth of climbing in the area, and it still is very incomplete, considering. The area map is even missing a whole highway! That sort of thing is frustrating.

I am planning on adding some climbing from Juneau, Homer, and hopefully a few other areas into the book. I had considered Fairbanks but since they are pretty much the only ones with a current guide, and it helps their alpine group I figured its best to hold that one off for the moment.

There will be no separate book for the Seward Highway, most of those areas will be included in the new book. This is again a call for pictures. If you think you have a good picture send it off! I really appreciate them and some of the last pictures I had sent made it into the book. So please send off!

On another note, I don't plan on updating the book. However I knew from the start that I would put out the current book and then update it soon afterward with that one staying longer on the shelves. It was such a difficulty getting the information to open up and the process down I wanted to get it out so that I could build off it more easily. That has occurred and information has come in very well! So I am excited to get a more precise and thicker book out. That may not seem like the right way to do it but I felt it was best so thats what I did.

Any idea when you will be publishing this new book?

I am thinking about January or February of next year. That should give me enough time to get new routes and put it all together.

Kelsey, I love your ARCG book and I am excited that you are updating it and adding new info on the Seward Highway crags. I think some of those routes have changed a lot since the SCAR was published and there have been some new routes put up. An updated guide is just what we need. I have two suggestions: 1) Not sure if is just my book, but the pages 95-131 are out of order and don't match the table of contents. The Upper Matanuska Valley, Introduction, and Ravine Lake come after the Wiener Lake climbs in my book, which is not correct. 2) I love the pictures but sometimes wish that the red/white and blue/white lines marking the routes were thinner. On some routes, like Festoon, for example, the blue/white line covers up the main features of the climb. A thin blue or red line would be better, drawn right next to the crack if it is a crack route. That's my 2 cents worth. Thanks for all the work you are putting into this. Tim

I agree with Tom. I don't like it when the lines on a guidebook obscure the actual climb.

Thanks Tim for chiming in!

About the first problem that was a last minute error that snuck in and ended up being my biggest disappointment with the first book! It won't happen in the second.

I will be making smaller lines in the second book and hopefully will fix the previous pictures to have smaller lines. Thanks for that comment as well as I had been debating it to myself and you finished the deal.