Tammy M. (Tamsbooks) reviewed Dances With Marmots - A Pacific Crest Trail Adventure on + 39 more book reviews
This story of a Pacific Crest Trail thru-hike is both the same and different as the dozens of other accounts Ive read.
It is the same because the trail is the same, the difficulties are the same, and the challenges of writing about a 5-month walking adventure are the same. After all, walking is not the most naturally engaging of activities.
But this book is also different from other accounts in some interesting ways. First, author George Spearing is from New Zealand, so we see his experiences on American soil from a new perspective. For example, he talks of being confused by a waitress asking him about Super Salad (soup or salad) and his realization that American English is otherwise different when he overhears the sentence, Then she up and left me...man, I was pissed. Apparently in NZ English, this meant the man was drunk or legless. Go figure. These instances give the book a humorous and interesting slant missing in other accounts.
On the other hand, American readers may not fully appreciate other references and attempts at humor such as referencing the un-coolness of wearing bells to ward off bears as being akin to a woodland Noddy or an itinerant Morris dancer. Huh?
One rather small, but irritating, aspect of this book is the random indentation of paragraphs. For some reason, I found this jarring.
However, these are small matters. Spearing writes with joy and humor of his journey. Never mind that the humor is sometime corny, at least he generally steers clear of the plodding mile by mile account of the journey that soon numbs the reader and makes one long for the Canadian border and the end of the book.
Though certainly not a masterpiece by any stretch of the imagination, this is one of the least painful books on Pacific Crest thru-hikes.
It is the same because the trail is the same, the difficulties are the same, and the challenges of writing about a 5-month walking adventure are the same. After all, walking is not the most naturally engaging of activities.
But this book is also different from other accounts in some interesting ways. First, author George Spearing is from New Zealand, so we see his experiences on American soil from a new perspective. For example, he talks of being confused by a waitress asking him about Super Salad (soup or salad) and his realization that American English is otherwise different when he overhears the sentence, Then she up and left me...man, I was pissed. Apparently in NZ English, this meant the man was drunk or legless. Go figure. These instances give the book a humorous and interesting slant missing in other accounts.
On the other hand, American readers may not fully appreciate other references and attempts at humor such as referencing the un-coolness of wearing bells to ward off bears as being akin to a woodland Noddy or an itinerant Morris dancer. Huh?
One rather small, but irritating, aspect of this book is the random indentation of paragraphs. For some reason, I found this jarring.
However, these are small matters. Spearing writes with joy and humor of his journey. Never mind that the humor is sometime corny, at least he generally steers clear of the plodding mile by mile account of the journey that soon numbs the reader and makes one long for the Canadian border and the end of the book.
Though certainly not a masterpiece by any stretch of the imagination, this is one of the least painful books on Pacific Crest thru-hikes.
