FREE TO ATTEND. No registration required.
Join us Thursday, September 7th at 6:30pm sharp at Pegasus on Solano to welcome Berkeley Walks co-authors Robert E. Johnson and Janet Byron in conversation with Rodney Paul of Bay Area Trails Confidential. We'll be celebrating the release of the new Berkeley Walks: Expanded and Updated Edition (out this summer from Heyday Books) with a special neighborhood walk!
Led by Byron and Johnson, the 3/4-mile walk includes neighborhood paths and an historic home designed by John Hudson Thomas. The walk leaves promptly at 6:30 p.m. from in front of the bookstore, with in-store discussion to follow at 7. Books will be available for purchase and signing at the event.
About the book:
A local bestseller, Berkeley Walks features 21 self-guided walking tours of Berkeley neighborhoods from North to South Berkeley and the Berkeley Hills to the Marina. Berkeley Walks celebrates the qualities that make Berkeley such a wonderful walking city: diverse architecture, panoramic views, tree-lined neighborhoods, unusual gardens, secret pathways, hidden parks, and vibrant street life. Historical surprises and architectural delights include the building from which Patty Hearst was kidnapped; Ted Kaczynski’s home before he became the Unabomber; and the residences of Nobel laureates and literary Berkeleyans such as Thornton Wilder, Anne Rice, and Philip K. Dick. With more than one hundred photographs, and detailed maps with hundreds of points of interest on the easy-to-follow, self-guided walking tours, Berkeley Walks is an indispensable guide to the wonderments and personalities associated with the city.
About the authors:
Robert E. Johnson and Janet Byron are longtime friends who met while leading urban walks for Greenbelt Alliance’s outings program. Together and separately, they have led walks around the Bay Area since the 1990s, including for Greenbelt Alliance, Berkeley Path Wanderers Association, Berkeley Historical Society, and Bay Nature magazine.
A Berkeley resident since 1988, Robert E. Johnson is a former financial analyst who served on the Greenbelt Alliance board for nearly 30 years.
Janet Byron is journalist, writer, and editor who worked for University of California and Kaiser Permanente, and as an independent editorial consultant. Byron is currently president and Johnson is a board member of Berkeley Path Wanderers Association.
About the moderator:
Rodney Paul has lived in the Bay Area since 1986 and had a 30-year career in tech before becoming a tour guide in 2015. He leads walking tours of the Haight Ashbury, Oracle Park, and Yerba Buena Gardens and also offers virtual programs on Zoom including Bay Area Trails Confidential, which explores and celebrates public spaces throughout our region.
