Feeling the chill of winter, are we? Just the time to escape to other, perhaps warmer, places and the people who live there…by reading a good book! Check out these titles and enjoy a little armchair traveling!
Walking the Gobi : a 1600-mile trek across a desert of hope and despair
by Helen Thayer
DS798.9.G63 T54 2007
New Book Island, 2nd floor
Walk 1600 miles of Mongolia’s Gobi Desert with 63-year-old Helen Thayer, her husband Bill, and their camels Tom and Jerry. Feel the 126-degree heat. Endure the sandstorms, scorpions, smugglers, dehydration, snakes, and other perils. Meet the nomadic people who populate the desert. Appreciate the scenery (black & white photos, vivid descriptions). And then maybe be ready for some more cold temperatures and that white precipitation here at home.
In the Sierra Madre
by Jeff Biggers
F1221.T24 B54 2007
New Book Island, 2nd floor
OK, given the elevation it may not always be warm, but this is still an interesting tale that will get your mind off of our weather for a while. Journalist Jeff Biggers spent a year among the Raramuri/Tarahumara, “the most resilient indigenous culture in the Americas.” Oh, and along the way you learn about the parade of visitors to the Sierra Madre in the past, including Confederate and Irish war deserters, French poets, Apache and Mennonite communities, writers, George Patton, Pancho Villa, and more.
Both books are first-person accounts by experienced travelers. Enjoy.
nice choice for armchair travel