Surviving the extremes

A very interesting book about what happens with the human body at the limits of human endurance. Unbelievable stories of things that happen to persons, and how they dealt with it. Definitely a book hard to put down!


 

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   € 13.50

Doris Pilkington: Rabbit-Proof Fence

The daughter of the oldest girl, Molly, the story traces the traumatic uprooting of the three sisters from their community in North Western Australia. Following a government edict in 1931, black children and children of mixed marriages were gathered up and brought to settlements where they were to be disciplined to abandon their aboriginal heritage, and taught to be culturally white. The three sisters, Molly, Gracie and Daisy quickly planned an escape from the Moore River Native Settlement with its harsh life of padlocks, barred windows, hard cold beds and horrible food. Solitary confinement was doled out as regular punishment and they were forbidden to speak their own language. The girls headed for the nearby rabbit-proof fence that stretches over 1000 miles through the desert toward their home. Their journey lasted over a month, and they survived on everything from emus to feral cats, while narrowly avoiding the police, professional trackers, and hostile white settlers. Their story is a truly moving tale of defiance and resilience. This book gives you a totally different view of the “good” Aussie culture!

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   € 11.50

Aron Ralston: Between rock and a hard place

Ralston's story is one of the most gut-wrenching and compelling real-life adventures in recent years: in early 2003, the avid rock-climber and outdoorsman became trapped in a Utah mountain canyon when an 800-pound boulder pinned his right arm. He spent six days there, fighting both the physical challenges of pain and dehydration, and the psychological horror that eroded his hope and energy. Eventually, he amputated his own arm with his pocket knife in order to gain his freedom. It's a truly remarkable story, and hearing Ralston retell it is alternately fascinating and unbearable.

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   € 23,90

Joe Simpson: Touching the void

Concise and yet packed with detail, Touching the Void, Joe Simpson's harrowing account of near-death in the Peruvian Andes, is a compact tour de force that wrestles with issues of bravery, friendship, physical endurance, the code of the mountains, and the will to live. Simpson dedicates the book to his climbing partner, Simon Yates, and to "those friends who have gone to the mountains and have not returned." What is it that compels certain individuals to willingly seek out the most inhospitable climate on earth? To risk their lives in an attempt to leave footprints where few or none have gone before? Simpson's vivid narrative of a dangerous climbing expedition will convince even the most die-hard couch potato that such pursuits fall within the realm of the sane

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   € 11,95

Barbara Savage: Miles from nowhere

If you ever dreamed about doing something really adventurous at least once in your life, you must read this book! There's no sugarcoating here - Barbara writes about the worst as well as the best of times, and it left me feeling that I will have never really lived until I do something like this myself. I wonder what they were thinking as they first rode out of Los Angeles, having never attempted anything remotely similar to this, and without even having really trained for it! I loved the part where they excitedly tried to strike up a conversation with the american tourists from the tour bus. Hysterical! And what a contrast of experiences between Barbara and Larry, and the typical "ugly americans" on the typical vacation.

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   € 13,95

Full Tilt: From Dublin to Dehli on a bicycle

Dervla Murphy's epic journey began during the coldest winter in living memory, and took her through Europe, Persia (Iran), Afghanistan, over the Himalayas to Pakistan and into India. A woman travelling alone in these countries was the unusual focus of interest and, even when the weather improved, there were difficulties and dangers enough to satisfy the most dedicated traveller. But although, in a world of vanishing tracks and political chaos, the solitary cyclist was grateful for the revolver in her saddle bag, her journey was enriched by acts of unexpected kindness.

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   € 14,95

Bill Bryson: In a Sunburned Country
Bill Bryson wrote a story about his exploits in Australia, where A-bombs go off unnoticed, prime ministers disappear into the surf, and cheery citizens coexist with the world's deadliest creatures: toxic caterpillars, aggressive seashells, crocodiles, sharks, snakes, and the deadliest of them all, the dreaded box jellyfish. And that's just the beginning, as Bryson treks through sunbaked deserts and up endless coastlines, crisscrossing the "under-discovered" Down Under in search of all things interesting.

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   € 13,50

Into the Wild
Jon Krakauer describes a story of a young man, who wanted to life, totally independent, in the beautiful but rough wilderness of Alaska. A couple of weeks later, his decomposed body was found by three moose hunters. What happened to the joung man and why does he wanted to life a normadic life in the wilderness? A sad but very interesting story and one of the best books I ever read!
 

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   € 12,32