Books

On any big endeavour, books often play the important roles of keeping the mnd active and staving off the boredom of early nocturnal retreats to the tent. Yesterday (a down day) I read both Bill Bryson's book A Walk in the Woods (now also a movie, which I actually preferred slightly), and Mike Allsop's High Altitude. Any excellently-written book by a great Kiwi adventurer. Currently just starting on Tony Hawks' (of '80s Stutter Rap fame, not Tony Hawk the skateboarder) rollicking good read Round Ireland With a Fridge. What are some of your favourite books? What little gems can I pick up along the way to read in my little one man tent each night?

ebook reader on the phone or a kindle , and go mad at amazon in the adventure section... Into Thin Air was a good read. Ed Stafford, walking the amazing The Last Viking, great biography of amundsen. anything with a good rating on the long trail walks in the states.. Balance on Blue is supposed to be a goodie. I read Skywalkers book on the apalachian, not a bad read Anthony Beevor, Crete. on the ww2 battle , peter fitzsimons Kokoda, on the ww2 battle was a real eye opener of a read. michael korda's Hero about lawrence of arabia i've got lawrences seven pillars of wisdom, but i dont find his writing the easiest to follow, i'm picking my way through it slowly. just about anything on Edmund hillary.

I heartily recommend the 2010 final print edition of Encyclopaedia Britannica. You might need plans to bivy outside your little one-man tent if you're to properly fit all 32 volumes inside each night.

Kindles the way to go. Into the wild The Martian. I am legend The road. Walden. Hunger Steppenwolf. Call of the wild Self reliance Rendezvous with Rama Grab any of these from the amazon kindle store and it will link you to an infinite list of awesome books.

Thanks guys. Read about half of those Gaiters. Thought about a Kindle, but I prefer an actual book.

Wow. Steppenwolf! Doesn't the main character spend the first 100 pages wandering around feeling sorry for himself? I really struggled with that book. The Road. I really liked that book. I like Cormac McCarthy's writing although not so much his obsession with shocking violence. The Road is about the one book of his I'd recommend. I read "The world without us" a few years ago which is an interesting thought experiment about how nature would recover if all humans vanished. Fascinating.

I'm a book lover too Kreig. I still buy books I love for the home library. But for travel and tramping a small kindle is light, compact has a month long battery, and best of all a million books in one.

Interesting topic. I am a compulsive reader But have always preferred hard copy as opposed to reading from a screen. I like the touch and feel of a hard copy book as well as the smell and different type faces and fonts. When I am working from a screen I dont seem to be able to appreciate the writing or upload the information (to use an electronic term) as well as when I a reading from hard copy ( I guess that is one reason why proofreaders work from hard copy) Having said that a Kindle with battery life of 1 month sounds appealing as the weight factor with "real books" can be a problem. A few years ago I went on a 3 week trip in and around the Southern Alps and towards the end was so desperate for something to read that I ended up reading the custard packet at Godley Hut

Another vote for Kindle - I have a special drybag for mine and take it everywhere. I like to load 4 or 5 books up before a trip, that way I can always find something to fit my mood at the end of a long day. I always swore I'd never go digital, but the sheer variety of books available at the click of a button and the excellent 'recommended for you' function (mentioned above) have won me over big time. Note : they're not so good below freezing, the screen blacks out :-)

backlit kindles are great, no headlamp needed to read them. still have a good battery life.