Travelers' Tales Alaska: True Stories (Travelers' Tales)

By Jon KrakauerPhilip CaputoPam Houston, et al.

In Travelers' Tales Alaska, contemporary adventurers, seekers, and lifelong Alaskans take you into the "Last Frontier" for wild and poignant adventures. Walk among bears, witness the Inupiat taking of a bowhead whale, and spend time "weathered-in" on the Bering Sea coast. Follow the seasons of commercial fisherfolk in the world's most dangerous seas, sail the Inside Passage, or flight-see with bush pilots famed for high-stakes navigation around Denali, North America's highest mountain. Discover the 49th state's quirky side, including an entire town that lives in a single World War II-vintage high-rise, a "Hairy Man" who roams the Bush, and backcountry gourmands who communicate with edible plants. Drive the Alaska Highway or head north along the pipeline Haul Road to the Arctic coast, not simply to get there, but to be there. Get the inside view as Alaskans share their stories of learning a new land or guiding tourists through Native culture. Whether you choose camping at Wal-Mart or casting for grayling on a lake named Paradise, whether you travel the Great Land in actuality or in your armchair, these stories bring Alaska alive, in all its latter-day complexity and glory.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1885211961
• ISBN13: 9781885211965
• Release Date: September 2003
• Publisher: Travelers' Tales
• Length: 326 Pages
• Weight: 0.90 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 5.2" x 8.0"

Customer Reviews

Three Decades In Alaska Tells Me These Stories Are True!

After twenty-nine years in this great land sometimes called the Last Frontier, I can tell you that the essays in Travelers' Tales: Alaska ring true. I, personally, flew with several of the colorful glacier pilots out of Talkeetna to climb in the Alaska Range including Doug Geeting, Cliff and Jay Hudson, and Lowell Thomas, Jr., and I especially enjoyed Jon Krakauer's The Flyboys of Talkeetna. In the Introduction to this collection and in his piece, Shot Tower, Dave Roberts, East Coast writer and mountaineer, reflects on his early years of Alaskan expeditions and he critically examines his relationship to climbing. If you like mountains, you will like these tales. This collection takes you on an Alaskan odyssey. The stories range from sea-kayaking up against monster glaciers in Glacier Bay (Tim Cahill's The Great White Philharmonic) to flying into a remote Forest Service cabin on the Kenai with your 19-day old infant, four-year old son, and grown husband to do a little grayling fishing (Andromeda Romano-Lax's Seeking Paradise) to helping Inupiat hunters haul in a whale killed in traditional fashion and divide the meat among community members (Heather Villars' On the Pack Ice). In Bill Sherwonit's Hairy Man Lives, you are treated to multiple first-hand recollections of encounters with Alaska's Sasquatch. Hairy Man is real in rural Alaska. I lived in Native villages for eight years, and I can vouch for this. In all my years here, I have learned that Alaska is a state like no other for direct experience with the beauty, mystery, and raw power of Nature. After reading this book, you will want to travel here to see for yourself. Or, if you have been here for a while, as I have, you will be reminded of why you came in the first place.