It took a tough cookie to make it on the northernmost edge of North America. In 1970, 41-year-old Fran Tate left everything behind and ventured to the top of the world. From oil rigs to a Mexican restaurant, from driving a sewage truck to a guest appearance on the Tonight Show, Fran has made her mark in the frozen North and beyond. Here's the unsinkable Fran Tate and the story of her adventures at the top of the world.
The author survives with odd jobs in Tokyo, celebrates Christmas in Rio and learns that fat women are sexy - in Jamaica. He discovers the charms of freezing Helsinki, experiences warlike conditions in Haiti and shells out $200 for a bottle of bottom-shelf whiskey in Alaska. He explores the secrets of lobster fishermen in Maine, assists in a cockfight in Puerto Rico and marvels at a Turkish pearl in Brooklyn. "A fun look at the world." "Want to go to exotic places? Read this first!" "Full of funny encounters with real people from around the globe." (Reader reviews) The travelogues in this book were commissioned by German NPR and broadcast on the radio. The author adapted the manuscripts to a literary format and added photos. More titles: The World Is My Oyster - Volume 2 The World Is My Oyster - Volume 3 The World Is My Oyster - Complete Collection (all 30 Stories in one volume)
"Jasper and his friends go to Gulaga to participate in the Tundra Trials, a team-based scavenger hunt that will have them journeying across the planet's frigid landscape to find enough cache boxes to win the competition"--
Whether you’re a born-and-raised Alaskan, a recent transplant, or just passing through, Alaska Curiosities will have you laughing out loud as B. B. Mackenzie takes you on a rollicking tour of the strangest sides of the Last Frontier State. Catch a glimpse of the ghost ship Clara Nevada, lost in a storm in 1898 while carrying a cargo of gold from the Klondike. Watch a baseball game on the longest day of the year in Fairbanks. Witness the Running of the Reindeer down 4th Avenue in Anchorage—held annually in March.
This part of David Flynn's autobiography continues age 50 through 65. The story includes teaching at a Nashville community college, adventures in Macedonia, the Ukraine, Japan, Alaska and the Amazon. A second marriage begins and survives. His daughter is hit by a delivery van in Japan. Much more, such as working with blues musicians.
This unique guide to one of the last wilderness frontiers is the essential companion for both intrepid adventurers and armchair travellers. Comprehensive coverae of the Arctic regions of Alaska, Canada, Finland, Greenland, Iceland, Norway, Russia and Sweden ; Special sections written by experts on Arctic issues including indigenous peoples and cultures, research, history, exploration, and literature ; Detailed activities chapter covering options from sea-kayaking to dogsledding ; 43 detailed maps.
The Sacramento Mountains are an oasis of cool pine forests, alpine meadows, and fast-flowing streams. For more than a century, the area has been a summer haven for people living in the surrounding desert. The town of Ruidosoa Spanish word meaning noisyis named for the sound of water rushing over rocks as the Rio Ruidoso runs (and occasionally rampages) through the town. The towns first resident, Civil War veteran Paul Dowlin, built an adobe mill that harnessed the rivers power. Word of the areas beauty soon spread. Traveling over primitive roads, first by horse and wagon and later by automobile, visitors escaped the summer heat in what became known as The Playground of the Southwest. Some came for horse racing or the gambling and night life offered by the towns many bars; others came to hike, fish, and later ski on the slopes of Sierra Blanca, the mountain whose 12,000-foot peak provides a stunning backdrop for the town.
Presents a narrative history of Mexican cuisine in the United States, sharing a century's worth of anecdotes and cultural criticism to address questions about culinary authenticity and the source of Mexican food's popularity.
In this lively, round-the-world trip, law professor and humorist Jay Wexler explores the intersection of religion and the environment. Did you know that • In Hong Kong and Singapore, Taoists burn paper money to appease “hungry ghosts,” filling the air with smoke and dangerous toxins? • In Mumbai, Hindus carry twenty-foot-tall plaster of Paris idols of the elephant god Ganesh into the sea and leave them on the ocean floor to symbolize the impermanence of life, further polluting the scarce water resources of western India? • In Taiwan, Buddhists practicing “mercy release” capture millions of small animals and release them into inappropriate habitats, killing many of the animals and destroying ecosystems? • In Central America, palm frond sales to US customers for Palm Sunday celebrations have helped decimate the rain forests of Guatemala and southern Mexico? • In New York, Miami, and other large US cities, Santeria followers sprinkle mercury in their apartments to fend off witches, poisoning those homes for years to come? • In Israel, on Lag B’omer, a holiday commemorating a famous rabbi, Jews make so many bonfires that the smoke can be seen from space, and trips to the emergency room for asthma and other pulmonary conditions spike? Law professor and humorist Jay Wexler travels the globe in order to understand the complexity of these problems and learn how society can best address them. He feasts on whale blubber in northern Alaska, bumps along in the back of a battered jeep in Guatemala, clambers down the crowded beaches of Mumbai, and learns how to pluck a dead eagle in Colorado, all to answer the question “Can religious practice and environmental protection coexist?”
The Arctic century is upon us. A great jockeying for power and influence has erupted among nations in the high north. At stake are trillions of dollars in profit or loss, US security, geopolitical influence and the fate of a fragile environment as well as the region's traditional people. As the ice melts and oil companies venture north, the polar regions may become the next Panama Canal, the next Arabian Peninsula-places on earth that remain relatively unknown in one century and become pivotal in the next. Now Shell oil plans to sink exploratory wells in the pristine waters off the North Slope of Alaska-a site that the company believes contains three times as much oil as the Gulf of Mexico. The Eskimo and the Oil Man tells this story through the eyes of two men, one an Iñupiat Eskimo leader on Alaska's North Slope, the other the head of Shell Oil's Alaska venture. Their saga is set against the background of an undersea land rush in the Arctic, with Russian bombers appearing off Alaska's coast, and rapid changes in ice that put millions of sea mammals at risk. The men's decisions will affect the daily lives of all Americans, in their cities and towns and also in their pocketbooks. The story begins as a fight and ends with a surprise. In the spirit of Thomas L. Friedman's Hot, Flat, and Crowded, bestselling author Bob Reiss traveled in America's High North over three years and spent time with scientists, diplomats, military planners, Eskimo whale hunters and officials at the highest levels of the government. He traveled to remote villages and sailed on a US icebreaker. The Eskimo and the Oil Man reflects the issues dividing every American community wrestling with the balance between energy use and environmental protection, our love of cheap gas and the romance of pristine wilderness.
