#book_review

In The Last Wild Men of Borneo, author Carl Hoffman tells the stories of two Westerners who spent their lives in Borneo during the 1970s and 1980s, when it was still largely wild and unexplored. Their personal journies are very different, but they both become embroiled in the changing nature of this beautiful land where orangutans roamed the jungles and tribes of native Borneans lived their lives as the had done for hundreds of years, unexposed to the outside world.

Norweigan explorer Thor Heyerdahl had a theory that the islands of the Pacific Ocean could have been first settled by pre-Colombian explorers from South America rather than the common belief that these settlers came from the North and West. In 1947 he and a crew of four set-offs from Peru on a simple balsa wood raft named Kontiki on a 5000-mile journey to prove this theory.

A young teenage boy in 1920s New York is determined to set out on the adventure of a lifetime to explore Antarctica. The only problem is he has no skills or experience to qualify him to join the American team scheduled to depart for the frozen continent. So, he decides to stowaway on one of the ships, starting a series of events that would change his life forever.

Confined to an endless cycle of boredom and frustration, one prisoner, Felice Benuzzi, realizes he can bear it no longer. When the clouds covering Mount Kenya part one morning to reveal its towering peaks for the first time, Benuzzi is transfixed. The tedium of camp life is broken by the beginnings of a sudden idea, an outrageous, dangerous, brilliant idea - to escape and climb the mountain.

In the 1990s John Krakauer was a contributor to Outside Magazine, a renown adventure publication when in 1996 they asked him to join a guided team to ascend Mount Everest. Krakauer was in a team led by Rob Hall. At the same time, another team was attempting the ascent led by Scott Fischer. Both men successfully guided clients to the summit but experienced severe difficulty during the descent as a massive storm hit the mountain. Sadly, several people, including the head guides lost their lives. This book tells the story from the perspective of John Krakauer.

This is the incredible story of a group of mostly young and inexperienced men who find themselves stranded in one of the most inhospitable places on the planet with very limited resources on which to live and how they found the spirit and desire to survive despite the odds stacked against them

This book captures a remarkable story of bravery, grit and determination. In August 1914 the 28 man crew of the British Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition (1914–16) left England under Shackleton’s leadership aboard the Endurance. Things did not turn out as planned and the tale becomes not one of achievement and success in the traditional sense but an incredible journey into the unknown and a battle for their lives.

In 1874 the journalist and explorer Henry Morton Stanley navigated the River Congo for the first time (as a foreign explorer). It was King Leopold of Belgium who expressed the most interest in his adventures as he was looking to build an empire. Hence the Belgium Congo was born! Tim Butcher, who also worked for the Daily Telegraph decided to follow in Stanley's footsteps - not a simple task as the country is as dangerous as it was in Stanley's time.

I have never even been tempted to climb mountains. I am not a thrill-seeker, at least one who wants to risk their life, but I do have a strange fascination for those who take on the most challenging adventures. I am addicted to reading books on an extreme adventure.

Despite his lack of experience of water adventure, in 1995 Joe Kane joined a group of adventurers intent on being the first American to travel the full 4,200-mile length of what may be the world’s most treacherous river: the Amazon.

"The River of Doubt" by Candice Millard sets out to tell the story of Roosevelt and his partners in their journey on the previously unexplored river, the Rio da Dúvida, or River of Doubt in the dense Amazon rainforest of Brazil. If you like stories of adventure and exploration then this is a great read.