December Nonfiction CAT: Adventures by sea, land, or air.

December is a month of reading nonfiction books about adventures by sea, land or air. This might be a bit of overlap with other nonfiction reads this past year so perhaps it is a catch up month for you.

Here are some suggestions.
Barrow's Boys: A Stirring Story of Daring, Fortitude, and Outright Lunacy by Fergus Fleming
Dead Reckoning: Great Adventure Writing from the Golden Age of Exploration by Helen Whybrow
Godforsaken Sea: Racing the World's Most Dangerous Waters by Derek Lundy
Into Thin Air by Jon Krakauer
The Last River: The Tragic Race for Shangri-la by Todd Balf
Ninety Degrees North: The Quest for the North Pole Fergus Fleming
Adrift: Seventy-six Days Lost at Sea by Steven Callahan
A Voyage for Madmen by Peter Nichols
Skeletons on the Zahara: a True Story of Survival by Dean King
The Fragile Edge: Diving and Other Adventures in the South Pacific by Julia Whitty
Great Heart: The History of a Labrador Adventure by James West Davidson
Wind, Sand, and Stars by Antoine de Saint-Exupery

And if you want more to consider here are some links.
https://bookriot.com/something-for-everybody-100-nonfiction-adventure-books/
https://www.artofmanliness.com/articles/50-non-fiction-adventure-books/
https://www.territorysupply.com/best-adventure-books

What suggestions do you have? What will you be reading? Have fun and don't forget the Wiki.

I may give Thunderstruck by Erik Larson a try for this challenge.

I'm thinking of Martha Gellhorn's Travels with Myself and Another.

I'll have to look into this one a bit to pick something for me, but I have a suggestion for those who like exploration (mostly because I just finished reading a different book by this author):
In the Kingdom of Ice / Hampton Sides

I'm sure I could offer more suggestions, too, if I was to take time to look. That's just one off the top of my head.

Top of my pile for this month is Poacher's Pilgrimage: an island journey by Alastair McIntosh, about a walk over 12 days from the southern tip of Harris to the Butt of Lewis (ie the entire length of the largest island of the Outer Hebrides).

I'd recommend A Night to Remember by Walter Lord. It's a superb telling of the Titantic disaster using interviews with survivors.

I'm tentatively choosing Canoeing with the Cree by Eric Sevareid as my book for this challenge.

I am considering something about travel or perhaps Walking towards Walden.

>6 fuzzi: I read the book The Last Voyage of the Andrea Doria recently and many passengers were reading that book!

Earlier in the year I read the memoir of Heather Poole, a flight attendant who had lots of interesting tales about life in the skies: Cruising Attitude.

I also have the memoir Flying Free, by Cecilia Aragon, about the first Latina pilot on the US aerobatic team, out from the library.

I have a bunch I could read (mostly Everest or mountain climbing), but I think I'm going to aim for Swimming to Antarctica by Lynne Cox.

It's by sea, just not how you would think!

I'm hoping to finish Barbarian Days: A Surfing Life , which I started over the summer, but haven't picked up since. Plus, Deep: Freediving, Renegade Science, and What the Ocean Tells Us About Ourselves.

I've found a contender on Overdrive: Lands Of Lost Borders: A Journey On The Silk Road by Kate Harris.

>13 pamelad: This started with the writer's childhood, which was in Canada, not on the Silk Road, so I put it aside and requested an ILL: A Winter in Arabia: A Journey Through Yemen by Freya Stark.

Started Seven Years in Tibet.

I ended up reading An Irish Country Christmas by Alice Taylor. The evocations of Ireland at Christmas time presented a charming view of life in the countryside, which is probably a nostalgic portrait, as I imagine the life was difficult on the authors' small farm. I have read this book in the past, and I enjoyed this reading just as much as I did the previous times.

Swimming to Antarctica / Lynne Cox
4 stars

Lynne Cox was a long distance swimmer. In the ocean. When she was a teenager in the 1970s, she swam with a group of other teenagers to cross the Catalina Island Channel in California. They were the first teenagers to do so. It only fuelled her desire for bigger, longer, colder swims. She worked for 10 years (meanwhile doing other swims: English Bay, Cook Strait (between the North and South Islands of New Zealand), the Nile River (ugh!) in Egypt, and many more) to be able to cross the Bering Strait (from Alaska to the Soviet Union – this was during the Cold War, which is why it was so difficult to get permission). Ultimately, after all that, she swam in the Antarctic Ocean in 32 F water for a hour.

This was really good. I’m not much into sports or swimming, but it was so interesting to learn all the planning and different things they have to think about and arrange when they do such swims. And it was even somewhat suspenseful – the cold! She obviously lived through it all to write this memoir, but to read about what was going through her head (and going on with her body) while she swam in water that was in the 40s F (then later, 30s!). So interesting!

>16 LibraryCin: Interesting thanks for the review. Was the Nile gross? Did she mention "things" in the water?

Thunderstruck was a fascinating story that alternated between Marconi's efforts to establish wireless communication and the Crippen murder case. Lots of traveling back and forth on ships and a thrilling finale involving two ships.

>17 Kristelh: Yes, yes she did. Ugh!

Apparently it's a race that happens every year, even still, though! Or, at least at the time, it did. Crazy!

>19 LibraryCin: that is why I don't like swimming in waters, don't like "things" in the water.

I have finished Seven Years in Tibet by Heinrich Harrer. The author escaped a prisoner of war camp in the Himalayas and made his way over the mountains to Lhasa. He witnessed the last years of the thousand year old Tibetan culture, before it was destroyed by the Chinese occupation.

Done!


Canoeing with the Cree by Eric Sevareid

A gripping true story of two teenagers' quest to paddle a canoe over 2000 miles from Minneapolis to Hudson Bay.

I have finished The eyes of the fleet which describes the careers of six frigate captains during the Wars of 1795-1815, some of whose adventures would have been called unbelievable in a fiction book, and who provided the blueprint for every naval historical fiction under the sun, starting with Captain Marryat who was midshipman under one of the captains mentioned here.

ETC

I just finished Poacher's Pilgrimage: An island journey by Alastair McIntosh, the account of a 12 day hike from the southern tip of the Isle of Harris to the northern tip of the Isle of Lewis (together they form the largest island of the Outer Hebrides). I thought it was great.

My December RandomCAT read also fits here: Clare Balding's Walking Home (like my last one, also about hiking).