Showing titles in Outdoors & Nature

Janet Messineo knew from the get-go that she wanted to become a great fisherman. She knew she was as capable as any man of catching and landing a huge fish. It took years - and many terrifying nights along on the beach in complete darkness, in search of a huge creature to pull out of the sea - for her to prove to herself and to the male-dominated fishing community that she could make her dream real. Casting into the Light is a book about following one’s dreams and about the quiet reckoning with self in the long hours of darkness at the water’s edge.

The words we use to name birds are some of the most lyrical and evocative in the English language. They also tell incredible stories: of epic expeditions, fierce battles between rival ornithologists, momentous historical events and touching romantic gestures. Through fascinating encounters with birds and the rich cast of characters who came up with their names, in Mrs Moreau's Warbler Stephen Moss takes us on a remarkable journey through time.

Helen Mort has always been drawn to the thrill and risk of climbing: the tension between human and rockface, and the climber's powerful connection to the elemental world. But when she becomes a mother for the first time, she finds herself re-examining her relationship with both the natural world and herself, as well as the way the world views women who aren't afraid to take risks.

From the founder of the Fat Girls Hiking community comes an inclusive, inspiring call to the outdoors for people of all body types, sizes, and backgrounds. In a book brimming with heartfelt stories, practical advice, personal profiles of Fat Girls Hiking community members, and helpful trail reviews, Summer Michaud-Skog creates space for marginalized bodies with an insistent conviction that outdoor recreation should welcome everyone.

On his 43rd birthday, Dick Conant, a golden boy who never quite grew up as those around him expected, stepped into a homemade boat to embark on a journey despite a gathering snowstorm. Among his possessions was a Gideon Bible and biographies of Einstein and Bismark. It was the beginning of an all-consuming odyssey by an unconventional man into the watery arteries of America, a journey to the unreported margins of society.

Hunting is an essential natural skill for human survival, but at the same time, it's so much more than that. Besides teaching us about the natural world, the resilient wildlife species that inhabit it, and food awareness, hunting is an excellent hobby or even profession. We can acquire and improve a few virtues such as patience, respect, ethics, confidence, responsibility, etc., and emotional control.

Van Life is a lifestyle associated with freedom. With four wheels on the road at all times, you can go anywhere and do anything. If you’ve considered walking away from it all to join the legions of van dwellers, let us lend a helping hand. Everywhere on social media, you see breathtaking pictures of converted vans. These people who have launched themselves into van living with complete success. They seem to live the ultimate dream of freedom, rebellion, and careless, peaceful existence. Are you ready to join them?

What compels mountain climbers to take the risks that they do? Is it the thrill in the physical accomplishment, in managing to defy the odds, or both - and why do they continue to do what they do in the face of such great danger? In On the Ridge Between Life and Death, David Roberts confronts these questions head-on as he recounts the exhilarating highs and desperate lows of his climbing career.

I Chose to Climb, first published in 1966, was Chris Bonington's first book. He was recognised then, as now, as one of the outstanding members of a brilliant generation of mountaineers. Here he describes his climbing beginnings as a teenager as well as successful ascents all over the world: the first ascent of the Central Pillar of Freney, the first British ascent of the North Face of the Eiger in 1962, Annapurna II in 1960 and in an unhappy expedition in 1961, Nuptse, the third peak of Everest.

In the spirit of his father's beloved classic, A River Runs through It, comes John N. Maclean’s true chronicle of his family and their bond with Montana's Blackfoot River - a profound and beautiful story about the power of place to bind generations, past and present.

Erik Weihenmayer was born with retinoscheses, a degenerative eye disorder that would leave him blind by the age of 13. But Erik was determined to rise above this devastating disability and lead a fulfilling and exciting life. In this poignant and inspiring memoir, he shares his struggle to push past the limits imposed on him by his visual impairment - and by a seeing world.

Tony Howard rose to fame in 1965 as a member of a group of young climbers from northern England who made the first British ascent of Norway's Troll Wall. Tony went on to design the modern sit harness, now used universally by every climber in the world. Tony has dedicated his life to travelling the world in search of never before climbed rock faces and remote trekking adventures. The scale of his travels is vast. Quest into the Unknown, the last word in adventure travel, is the jaw-dropping account of a life of adventure that is the very definition of true exploration.

In January 2006, a month or two after my father died, I thought I saw him again - a momentary impression of an old man, a little stooped, setting off for a walk in his characteristic fawn corduroys and shabby quilted jacket. After teenage rifts it was walking that brought us closer as father and son, and this ghost of Dad has been walking at my elbow since his death, as I have ruminated on his great love of walking, his prodigious need to do it - and how and why I walk myself.

You want to go fishing, but you have become bored with it lately. It is no longer the challenge it used to be. You have heard about fly fishing, but you are not sure how to get started. You've seen the fly fishermen out on the banks of the river, but you don't know how to cast like they can. You might be thinking to yourself, can I do it? The answer is yes!

Tourists visit popular islands of the Caribbean by the planeload. What they don't see from their resort hotels are the hundreds of out-of-the-way, uninhabited islands sprinkled along the West Indies, from Florida to South America. This alluring archipelago, strung with beaches accessible only by boat but spaced temptingly close together, led Mississippi adventurer Scott B. Williams to embark upon an open-ended quest to see how far south he could go in a 17-foot sea kayak.

Born in the late 1880s to a gritty mining magnate who made his millions in the California gold rush and a well-bred mother descended from one of New York’s distinguished families, society beauty Louise Arner Boyd was raised during a glittering era. After inheriting a staggering family fortune, she began leading a double life. She fell under the spell of the north in the late 1920s after a sailing excursion to the Arctic Ocean. Over the next three decades, she achieved international notoriety as a rugged and audacious polar explorer while maintaining her lifestyle as a society woman.

David Roberts, "veteran mountain climber and chronicler of adventures" (Washington Post), has spent his career documenting voyages to the most extreme landscapes on earth. In Limits of the Known, he reflects on humanity's - and his own - relationship to extreme risk. Part memoir and part history, this book tries to make sense of why so many have committed their lives to the desperate pursuit of adventure.

An honest account of a woman's trek on the John Muir Trail is captured in this lively trail journal. Celebrate her joy as the beauty of the High Sierra in California is slowly revealed, feel the comradery of trail friends she meets along the way, and sympathize with her when all she wants is for the trail to end. Along the way — hikers of all ages — but especially mature hikers, will see how she and her husband met challenges head-on, lightened their load, planned meals and managed daily logistics for more than three weeks on the trail.

In The Last of His Kind, renowned adventure writer David Roberts gives readers a spellbinding history of mountain climbing in the twentieth century as told through the biography of Brad Washburn, legendary mountaineering pioneer and photographer. Jon Krakauer, author of Into Thin Air, has praised David Roberts, saying, “Nobody alive writes better about mountaineering” - and nowhere is that truth more evident than in this breathtaking account of the life and exploits of America’s greatest mountain climber.

Bob Shepton is an ordained minister in the Church of England in his 70s, but spends most of his time sailing into the Arctic and making first ascents of inaccessible mountains. No tea parties for this vicar. Opening with the disastrous fire that destroyed his yacht whilst he was ice-bound in Greenland, the book travels back to his childhood growing up on his family's rubber plantation in Malaysia, moving back to England after his father was shot by the Japanese during the war, boarding school, the Royal Marines, and the church.