Highs and Lows on the John Muir Trail by Inga Aksamit Review: An Honest, Practical Trail Journal

A niche but award-recognized trail journal, Highs and Lows on the John Muir Trail earns its place on the shelf of anyone planning — or dreaming about — the High Sierra's most celebrated thru-hike, though readers with higher expectations for literary craft may find the experience uneven.

Highs and Lows on the John Muir Trail is a non-fiction trail journal, published in December 2015 by Pacific Adventures Press, in which California-based backpacker Inga Aksamit recounts her thru-hike of the John Muir Trail with her husband Steve. The JMT runs roughly 211 miles through the Sierra Nevada, sharing a significant section with the Pacific Crest Trail and culminating near Mount Whitney, and the route is widely regarded as one of the most picturesque and physically demanding long-distance trails in the United States. The book traces Aksamit and Steve's journey through that landscape chapter by chapter — from the opening "Fire and Lightning" through segments covering landmarks such as Red's Meadow and the push to Whitney — capturing both the elation and the suffering that define a high-mileage Sierra hike. The trail involves a cumulative 84,000 feet of elevation gain and loss, more than twice the total elevation of Mount Everest, and the book does not shy away from the moments when Aksamit simply wants the trail to end.

What distinguishes this book from a purely personal memoir is its substantial back matter. Beyond the narrative, Aksamit includes a gear list, a meal planning guide, a cleanliness guide, a full JMT itinerary, a High Sierra Trail itinerary, a pass elevations chart, and a recommended reading list. This appendix suite transforms the book into something closer to a hybrid trail journal and planning reference — a dual purpose that readers who are actively researching or preparing for a JMT attempt will find especially useful. Photographs appear in each chapter to illustrate the trek, grounding the narrative in the visual reality of the High Sierra.

The trail-journal genre is well established, and Highs and Lows on the John Muir Trail has earned a meaningful credential within it: the book is a winner of the Best Outdoor Book Award from the Outdoor Writers Association, as noted on Aksamit's own site. That recognition places it in documented company with other serious outdoor literature and gives it a legitimacy beyond self-promotion. Aksamit is also the author of The Hungry Spork: A Long Distance Hiker's Guide to Meal Planning, establishing her as a voice with a consistent focus on the practical and experiential side of long-distance hiking — the JMT journal sits naturally within that body of work.

The book's stated design is to deliver an honest account rather than a triumphalist one. The publisher description specifically highlights Aksamit's candor — readers are invited to share in her joy as the High Sierra's beauty unfolds, to feel the camaraderie of the trail friends she meets along the way, and equally to sympathize when exhaustion and doubt set in. That structural honesty, foregrounding both the highs and the lows of a grueling thru-hike, is the book's defining tonal choice. Some readers on StoryGraph describe the early chapters as tense and uncertain in tone, but report that the narrative finds its footing and becomes a pleasurable journey as Aksamit and Steve push deeper into the trail.

The mixed reader response is worth naming plainly. Some readers on StoryGraph characterize the writing as below average for the non-fiction trail-journal category, describing it as sub-par and finding the overall account less compelling than expected — even for an audience that actively enjoys the genre. This is a genuine limitation: readers who come to trail literature expecting polished prose or the kind of literary depth associated with celebrated hiking memoirs may find Highs and Lows uneven. The book's greatest strengths are its authenticity and its practical utility, not its stylistic ambition. Readers who prioritize those qualities — especially those with a specific interest in the JMT and a tolerance for unadorned, journal-style writing — are the natural audience. Those seeking a more literary outdoor narrative may want to set expectations accordingly before committing.