I have to admit, I received this as an Early Reviewer book way back in June, and am just now getting around to reviewing it. I liked the idea behind the book a lot, and enjoyed reading about all the great places. I especially liked that it's geared toward the "mature" traveler, and gives details about the condition the traveler should be in for the various trips. However, I was very sorry it didn't include any maps, which is surprising, since it's published by National Geographic. I have other National Geographic travel books, and they all include little maps of the places described. This would be very helpful for some of the trips in particular, like the one to Baffin Island, the three different Sierra Madre trips, and the Brahmaputra and Malabar trip in India. I do want to say thanks to the Early Reviewer staff who picked this book for me. I'd love to go on every one of these trips. ( )

For someone who loves to travel but who hasn't just now got the time, money, or physical endurance to take an extreme trip, this is a great book. The trips are set out in chapters of a length easy to read while waiting in line to have your oil changed or waiting for the water to boil for the spagetti. The trips are well-described, and include approximate cost, length, endurance requirements, and special challenges, as well as anecdotes that the individual traveler experience on his/her own trip. The only fault I found with the book ~ and admittedly it's a small, picky one ~ was that there were no images, though, this was an ARC and perhaps the regularly published version will include pictures. ( )

Note: Review of an Early Release Version.

They should put a warning label on this book: “Caution! Reading more than two chapters of this book at one sitting may cause you to quit your job to do more adventure traveling before it’s too late!” I read “Riding the Hulahula to the Arctic Ocean” slowly –
partly to savor the descriptions of the adventure travel and partly because I found myself daydreaming about planning more and longer trips after I had read a chapter or two.

“Hulahula” is a “must read” book for seasoned (that is, experienced, older) travelers who are looking for new places to explore that are off the beaten track. The Hulahula is not a Hawaiian dance but a river in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, and you get a first person account of what it is like to raft down it. The book also takes you “up close and personal” on encounters with mountain gorillas in Uganda, and you learn how one of the authors broke down in tears and proposed to his then-girlfriend at Machu Picchu, what it feels like to take a walking safari in Zambia and lots more.

The trips are described in first person narratives that give you a far better idea of what to expect than the standard guidebooks provide – if they cover the trips at all. You also get helpful hints about issues that those of us who are no longer twenty-somethings care about: what kind of shape you should be in to keep up with the others in your group, the toilet facilities, and whether the beds or camping spots will be friendly to people with bad backs. The book also includes useful information on the travel companies that specialize in each trip, possible variations on the trips and prices. My advice: read the book and then get going! Time’s a-wasting! ( )

My very first Early Review book, and a fine one it is.
Riding the Hulahula to the Arctic Ocean is a very enjoyable travel book, an excellent combination of the dreams ever travel book should bring out in us, combined with a good deal of practical advice that would make those dreams more possible.
From the coast of India, to the mountains of Peru, to the colorful lighthouses of the Magdalen Islands...complete with web addresses and phone numbers and lots of practical advice.

Whether you have your suitcase packed and ready to go....or will not likely venture far from your Strat-O-Lounger, I think you will find this book enjoyable. ( )

Preliminary findings after reading the Intro, a few chapters, and skimming the rest ~ I simply must win the lottery so I can go on every one of these trips!!! This is one of those travel books that I can only read a short section at a time, because I start to hyperventilate (or cry) because I want so badly to be able to make plans to travel NOW. Fortunately, the book is well-suited to that sort of perusal (not the crying, but the reading in short sections). For example, the title trip (Riding the Hulahula to the Arctic Ocean) is 10 pages long, and includes sections on the writer's personal story surrounding the trip, a description of the trip, the environment traveled to/through, the physical requirements of the trip, a brief anecdote of something that happened during the trip, and four short sections on why to go, special issues and challenges, variations and options, and resources and information, which includes the approximate cost of the trip. Now, that trip isn't one that I'm likely to take, what with my arthritis and all, but it sure was great to read about it.

ETA that I'm dipping into this book a few times a week, one or two sections at a time, whenever I have a break in my day but there's not enough time to get into one of the novels I'm currently reading. It's great for that kind of reading experience ~ the sections are neither too long nor do they require a lot of deep thought. Just right for a 15-30 minute reading break.

ETA: Just finished the section on hiking up to Macchu Pichu and bitterly regret not going there a decade or two ago when I might have made it. Also regret that the ARC doesn't have pictures of this particular trip. Guess I'll have to find a book on Macchu Pichu from the library that does have pix. (8/3/08) ( )