Lost Worlds of the Guiana Highlands
Stewart McPherson
I’m guessing most viewers of the Pixar flick Up were convinced that the surreal, twisted landscape on the top of the mountain where the balloon-house landed were figments of overheated animators’ brains. However, based on the pictures in Lost Worlds of the Guiana Highlands, it is clear that much of the artwork was straight still-life renditions of the eerie scenery at the top of these remote cloud-shrouded mountains. The tepuis, mountain islands shooting vertically thousands of feet into the air, have been objects of fascination and speculation for centuries. Until the 1800s, no one had ever managed to climb to the top of the straight and treacherous mountains. Despite their immense inaccessibility, numerous stories have...
Travels in Siberia
Ian Frazier
Frazier’s dense and fascinating look at Siberia from seven trips over two decades makes a nowhere place into somewhere. Most often associated with gulag camps and cold, Siberia is as as vast and varied hunk of land as the US. Starting with his early fascination with the country, Frazier recounts his earliest forray into Siberia and his decision to mount a full-scale trip. The seven week drive across the country shows both beautiful country and the ravages of an ugly past – from the Mongols to Communism. His accounts of the residents, food, swarms of mosquitoes and their ever-dying van make the trip into an adventure. A fair amount of Russian history is mixed in, though without the tedious rote of a textbook. In later trips,...
Stephen Fry in America
Stephen Fry
British actor and comedian Stephen Fry (Jeeves of Jeeves and Wooster fame) is that rare breed of European – one who actually likes Americans. In his attempt to show his British audiences that we aren’t all a bunch of loud, vulgar, gun-toting religious nuts he undertakes a project to visit all 50 states…in a black British taxi. Many of his visits are more than just tourist spots. He visits the boarder patrol in Texas, the homeless in Oklahoma and Hmong food stores in Minnesota. He also visits Ted Turner on his bison ranch, the Maharishi University in Iowa, hunts, canoes, eats tons of fried stuff and generally has a grand time…with lots of ridiculous safety gear involved:
How is it that work clothes know when they are...
101 Places NOT to See Before You Die
Catherine Price
I was a bit disappointed that many of the places Price lists are related to a personal anecdote (albeit hilarious), don’t really exist (hell) or you would not be able to experience yourself (being a bull at the running of the bulls). However, there are plenty of doozies I have to agree wholeheartedly with: Wall Drug, Times Square on New Year’s Eve, the Inside of a Chinese Coal Mine, The Grover Cleveland Service Area, etc. Despite not quite living up to the standard “101 places…” template, the book is still very amusing, as are the guest comments from other writers like AJ Jacobs. Yes, there are many hellish places that didn’t make it in (Gary, IN, I’m looking at YOU!) this still give you a ...
American Shaolin
Matt Polly
Chinese kung-fu is one of the most glorious examples of obsessive-compulsive behavior in the history of human culture.
There is a certain type of person who needs something to hang onto, make their own and Focus On (yes, with caps). For some reason, martial arts (and religion) seem to draw these folks to them. Polly is a kind of uber-obsessive in that he actually moved to China to study kung-fu at the Shoalin temple. Like anything portrayed in Hollywood movies it is both completely different and yet exactly as portrayed. Polly’s outsider exuberance and overwhelming desire to fit in is at times rather sad and pathetic. Yet I can’t help admire him for giving his all and truly immersing himself in his quest for knowledge. He ...
Off the Tourist Trail
Eyewitness Travel
This is SUCH a dangerous book if you like to travel. Here are a thousand alternative trips and places to visit off the standard tourist trail. Usually less expensive than the big names, much less-visited and often harder to get to, these destinations are so very tempting. Find alternatives to the over-touristed Machu Picchu in Isla del Sol which is much more intact and barely visited. Visit Lalibela, a stone church carved into the ground, as opposed to tourist-packed Petra. There are cheaper tropical islands, festivals of every sort, canyons, falls and train routes. Oh so tempting!