Long nights offer good reading time Favorite books are also good gifts

After a long summer of endless weekends in the outdoors hiking and backpacking, I actually look forward to winter. I get a chance to slow down along with the season and rest. The days are shorter. The time I spend outside snowshoeing and skiing is usually limited to daylight hours, naturally restricting my activity. There’s even an advantage to the long nights. I can finally catch up on my reading.

Most hikers don’t have any idea what a beach book means. But, ask any hiker or mountaineer for their favorite field guide, hiking or mountain adventure book and you’ll get a list.

So, what follows is a list of favorite books that appear frequently as most read and renowned among people who love the outdoors as trekkers and adventurers. There are classic works as well as more modern. Any of these books could show up on a holiday wish list as well.

Maine & New England

The Wildest Country, A Guide to Thoreau’s Maine, by J. Parker Huber, Appalachian Mountain Club, 1981.

The book is out of print but still available at Amazon.com and local used bookstores. It is a retracing of Thoreau’s travels in the “wildest country,” as he put it, in Maine. The East and West Branches of the Penobscot are canoed by the author as well as all of Thoreau’s other major expeditions by canoe, horseback or on foot to Katahdin, Moosehead Lake, Chesuncook and the Allagash Lakes. Clear maps, campsite descriptions, excellent sections on trees, plants and wildlife along the route, and a great bibliography make this the resource book for Thoreau’s views on Maine wilderness.

Roadside Geology of Maine, by D. W. Caldwell, Mountain Press Publishing, 1998

The most comprehensive guide to the geologic features of Maine either from the road or near the road. Caldwell admits in the preface that he couldn’t possibly cover all the roads in the state. It’s still impressive to describe the geology along The Airline, Bangor to Calais, Route 2 from Skowhegan west to New Hampshire, 400 miles of Route 1 and 300 miles of I-95. Throw in descriptions of a dozen or so other roads from Bethel to the Aroostook County and it’s a pretty thorough book. He describes the geologic features and the events that created the landscape of Maine from the coast to the mountains in clear enough language for even non-scientists to understand.

The text is accompanied by detailed maps and diagrams. There are excellent sections on the geology of many of Maine’s state parks and Acadia National Park. There’s a thorough description of the mountain and lake building events in Baxter State Park, including the landscape under the trails. This is a great book to have in the car on the way to the trailhead to other spots in Maine as well. Your hiking partner can spot the features while on the road or when you’re stopped for car camping. It’s a little heavy for the pack but some of the places he describes do involve some hiking.

Not Without Peril, Nicholas Howe, Appalachian Mountain Club Books, 2000

This book is not a guide, but a chronicle of the most renowned human disasters on Mount Washington and the White Mountains in New Hampshire over the past 150-plus years. Because of the nature of the book recounting human failure in the mountains, it was quite controversial among hikers and mountaineers. However, as lessons in what not to do in the mountains, this book is invaluable. The 17 stories plus descriptions and maps of the routes the doomed participants took, are gripping.

Mountain Adventure

Touching The Void, Joe Simpson, Originally published J. Cape, 1988, HarperCollins 2004

The defining book of courage and determination to survive in the face of impending disaster. This book is the basis for the documentary film in 2004 of the same name. It recounts the story of Simpson who, with Simon Yates, successfully climbed 22,000-foot Siula Grande in the Peruvian Andes in 1985. Then, in a storm on the descent Simpson falls, breaking his leg. His partner lowers him down the face of the mountain on the end of a rope. Yates lowers him over a cliff face, where Simpson dangles for hours. Threatened with being pulled off the mountain, Yates cuts the rope. Simpson falls into a crevasse, with Yates leaving him for dead. Simpson crawls on his broken leg for two days going six miles back to their camp and rescue. Even non-mountaineers can identify with this story of mountain adventure.

Climb to Conquer, Peter Shelton, Scribner, 2003

The book’s title comes from the motto of the 10th Mountain Division’s Army Ski Troops. The book tells the story of the division’s formation, the only Army division founded by citizens. Their development and achievements in World War II are legendary and make this book an adventure book of a different sort. The ski troops never fought on skis but did climb an “unclimbable cliff” at night to attack the German emplacement at the top. In an effort perhaps even more renowned than their war exploits, the veterans of the division became influential in the post-war outdoor recreation industry, alpine skiing, hiking and backpacking. Excellent book on what could be called the greatest division of the greatest generation.

The Hard Way, Mark Jenkins, Simon & Schuster, 2002

The title “The Hard Way” is also the title of Mark Jenkins adventure column for Outside Magazine. It also defines Jenkins approach to life and adventure, because he does everything the hard way. In the book, a collection of his best columns, he travels the world climbing mountains, where arrival is uncertain and returning intact is never a guarantee. The stories are written in Jenkins’ sparse, no-frills style, which reflects his surroundings, whether on the Matterhorn in the Alps or on Everest. This guy lives a life to envy and in this book he takes us along with him.

To the Summit, Joseph Poindexter, Black Dog & Leventhal Publishers, 1998

This huge coffee table book’s subject is the world’s most loved and most dramatic mountains. The full-color photos, some four-page pullouts, are stunning. This is the ultimate mountain-lovers book covering all of the world’s major summits. The photos are accompanied by text written by the foremost mountaineers in history. Poindexter has created an homage to the world’s most beautiful and challenging terrain. It’s sure to be a must-own volume for anyone who appreciates mountains and breathtaking scenery.

There you have it, a few of the books on my winter reading list. Any or all of these books are sure to get you through another season of the long, dark nights of winter.

Brad Viles is an avid hiker who has logged some 8,000 lifetime miles, including the Appalachian Trail. He can be reached at sball1@ prexar. com