Camping Books

Good book. A great deal of common sense but some good reference material. I am looking at this to help train my BSA Troop; I think this has some wonderful material to help them. I have found that all of the NOLS books have some very good and useful information.

I'm a NOLS grad and was asked to do a class for our local Boy Scout troop on winter camping and snow shelters. I picked up a copy of NOLS Winter Camping and found it to be a fantastic resource. The illustrations were very helpful and the instruction was well organized, easy to read and use. The kids are going camping this weekend and they will be sleeping in a snow cave.

This was a very good book for somebody who is just getting into winter camping. The information is solid and reliable, and it is laid out in a very readable fashion. I have other books by Buck Tilton, and his writing style is always very engaging, Unfortunately, my initial excitement that NOLS (The National Outdoor Leadership School) had finally brought out a guide to winter camping, was dampened by the basic nature of the material. I look to NOLS to challenge and expand my knowledge base, and although I am an experienced winter adventurer, I am hardly an expert. I was also disappointed that what are known as "traditional" winter travel and camping techniques receive almost no mention, except for two scant paragraphs on snowshoes.

As I stated, the book is good, and is a worthy addition to any winter recreation library. But if you are just getting into the activity, I would steer you towards Stephen Gorman's "Winter Camping, 2nd Edition" (1999, Appalachian Mountain Club) as a better guide on how to get into what is referred to by some guides as "the undiscovered season."

After the course with Wilderness Medical Associates, I bought the book to have as a referance. It became much more as I learned more then I thought. It is a book that anyone going into the wilderness should have.

An excellent book. Rather than discussing different catagories of injuries and medical issues peice-meal, it presents basic underlying principles and a system for approaching accidents and medical issues then discusses accidents through that system. It is the most cohesive, integrated wilderness first aid text I have come accross. It uses simple language, and gets the job done without being overly technical (but it is not dumbed-down). It is so accessible and well put together you will actually pick it up and refer back to it (with ease). It is simply a very practical and clear book on wilderness medicine.

This book is simple for the layman to understand. Provides good detail into how the body reacts to wounds, infection, loss of blood etc. Educates the reader to understand the body systems which makes proper treatment understandable and predictable. No more trying to memorize what to do for this injury or that.

Great collection of history, really shows the tradition of camping and outdoor adventure that the people of this country enjoy.

Funny and informative book about camping and back packing around the beginning of the 20th century. The recipe for waterproofing boots (pine tar and cod liver oil) is probably worth the price of the book. The ads are priceless. Historical photographs are a treasure for photography buffs. Striped canvas tents in Yosemite; Phoebe Apperson Hearst in a striped tect, sitting in a rocking chair at at desk, with an iron bedstead beside her. Ruth Smith

It's hard to neatly peg this attractive, even whimsical survey of camping: part Western history and part survey of camping's changing environment and methods, PAST TENTS blends both vintage and contemporary black and white photos of outings with historical background on the changing nature and perception of the American camper in the West. Both history and general-interest collections, especially those where camping and outdoors topics are a popular lend, will find this an excellent acquisition and perfect, eye-catching display choice.

Diane C. Donovan
California Bookwatch

I can not tell you about the book, because I have not orderd it yet.

This is a fantastic book. It goes well beyond the inadequate operators guide. It helps you trouble shoot everything and learn all the parts. You can go from not knowing anything about watercraft to being a self mechanic. Also, it allows you to talk the jargon with SeaDoo repair shops so you don't get the runaround when having maintenance done to your watercraft.

The book, with the exception of the cover, appears to have been made on a copy machine. Very poor quality images. The repair and maintenance procedures covered aren't all that complete either. Some good advice and tips but don't expect to overhaul your Sea-Doo with this thing. If you already have a factory shop manual this book would be a good supplement.

The first Pig Pig book I read is Pig Pig Grows Up. I didn't even know he had made other books. Pig Pig Goes to Camp wasn't as good as Pig Pig Grows Up but it was still really funny. It is a good introduction to sleep-away camp for kids ages 7 - 9. The one part that I didn't like although many people think it's funny is that the Camp Director sends Pig Pig home because he's having too much fun and is too popular. I think the idea was that he was sent home because of all his little Frog friends but it comes across the wrong way.

This children's book goes into detail of what it is like to spend time away at Camp. What camp is like from leaving mom to sleeping at camp, sharing time with friends at camp. It adds to the camp activities by having Pig Pig make friends with frog. He makes so many friends that the frogs keep multiplying everywhere he goes. Eventually he makes so many frog friends, they send him home early with some of his new buddies. A must read for a child going to camp with a sense of humor.

He's off to camp. Treat yourself and your little ones to this great McPhail book. Boys and girls alike will love this book. Pig Pig makes some interesting friends while attending camp. It's bound to put a smile on your face and a giggle in your throat.

The Road Trip Pilgrim's Guide speaks to the adventurer, seeker and innocent spirit within us all. I've opened this light-hearted guide countless times for practical travel advice, pure inspiration, and often - for just a good giggle.

There is truly something for everyone in these pages - whether your trekking to the farthest reaches of the globe, pico-pilgrimaging to the local park or just to accompany you on the most wondrous & continuous pilgrimage of all - life.

So, yes! Please pick up a copy now, fearlessly follow your heart ... & stay true.

The Road Trip Pilgrim's Guide is one of those books that doesn't fit into just one category. Instead, it does a great job of offering sound road-tripping guidance and sharing interesting stories for all manner of would-be travellers- at the same time.

Having never been on a long pilgrimage like some of those highlighted by author-adventurer Dan Austin, I found insights from these treks especially interesting. But he doesn't neglect the day-trip pilgrim in his praise of more involved trips. The Guide is refreshingly supportive of all lengths and types of pilgrimages, which is sure to make everyone from beginners to seasoned "pilgrims" feel excited and prepared for whatever trip they embark upon next.

The Guide begins each chapter with a personal story submitted by those who have gone before (there's a lot of variety in these short testimonies), and the entire book is carried along by principles taken from Austin's own journeys, anecdotes and all. But Austin's insights are far from frivolous or surface-level; in fact, he often returns to the themes of honor, perseverance, vision, and spiritual awareness that he encourages his readers to take very seriously while on their own adventures. Combine this with the candid wisdom about everything from disabling common park sprinklers to attracting members of the opposite gender while "homeless, sweaty, and broke" and you've got an impressive, all-inclusive handbook for the modern pilgrimage.

All in all, I recommend it quite highly. It's both informative and entertaining, and will prove a useful tool for anyone up for the adventure.

Whether your apartment is a charming combination of Coleman stoves and jars of wet peanut butter, you're gearing up for your first fresh-faced road trip across Delaware in your hatchback, or your idea of adventure is trying a new salsa for Monday Night Football, you'll find Austin's book inspiring and entertaining. The collection of personal narratives launching each chapter, and the wealth of photography collected from Austin's own adventures make you want to cinch up your Carhartt's, grab your journal, and hit the road. Don't borrow this book. Buy it--you're not gonna want to leave it behind.

The authors are a couple that have an easy to read, friendly style giving lots of detailed illustrations, bold subject titles, tips in the margins, index, etc. The book covers The Campsite, The Campers, The Camping and Après Camp. The Appendix includes Ideas for outdoor meals. It even has a Checklist including: Camp Setup, Food Preparation and Storage, Camper's Needs, Your Choice, Canoe/Kayak/Other Boat, Car, Dog. Zora & David Aiken quickly seem like good friends giving you excellent experienced advice on everything to get you started, or to improve your camping experience. If you're looking for your first book on camping, this is the only book you will need.

First of all the interior artwork is very charming, featuring some humerous line drawings. I gave it an extra star for that. As for the content, this book is OK but... I could not help wanting more. It looks big but has these huge margins on each page that are repeating what is in the text, most of the time.

It covers many ranges of the camping topic, but it does not cover any of them deeply enough, or make solid reccommendations. For example on the tents section, they cover the basic shapes of tents and lightly review what are some of the best points of each, but it is a thin review. They do not make any outright reccommendations and it is like the light fluff stuff you see in the Saturday newspaper articles. Most subjects are glossed over very quickly. I guess I am spoiled since I have quite a few books in my camping library to draw from. The books offered by Cliff Jacobson are good even though they are shorter, and are offered here at Amazon.com as well. The best I have found is the "The Backpackers Handbook, 2nd edition". Also the "Roughing It Easy" book is really good if you like a book that tells you how to amke your own gear and camp economically.

With many photos and illistrations, Simple Tent Camping is a must have book for anyone interested in spending time in the great outdoors. The book walks the reader through the steps of buying equipment, planing a trip, setting up a site, cooking food, first aid, and even provides lessons for taking trips by canoe. If you are new to camping, or looking for a more in depth guide, Simple Tent Camping is a must have.

I've read this book and re-read it a few times now. Initially it occurred to me that the writer, Craig S Roberts, did seem to be a little paranoid, and rants a bit about government invasions of privacy, however, the information in the book is still good and valid.

This book really reads like it is from someone who has been there and done that. The book is obviously self published, and comes in a printed or photocopied format with a plastic binding comb. So presentation is lacking, but the quantity and quality of information is really there. The book covers how to keep warm in your car very well. It also covers ways to keep cool in hot weather, where to obtain and store water, how to go to the toilet in your car, how to wash up in your car, cooking in cars (with safety advice for using a camp stove) places to park your car, even what sort of containers are most practical to use in your car. There is good advice on what electrical appliances can be ran from an inverter from your car's battery which tends to match advice I have read else where.

You can of course view the table of contents for this book here on Amazon. While many of the chapters are only a few pages long, the content is there. Some of it is common sense, but a lot is ideas and knowledge that you would only gain from a book like this. Craig writes well and to the point. He rarely repeats himself, so the book has not been padded out. He appears to have researched his methods and advice. He does contradict himself once about solar cells, saying at one point they are of little benefit, but he later goes on to explain they have their uses and gives good details about how to use them.

His advice on police encounters is amusing. His "I am not an enemy of the United States" comments are likely to cause you more trouble than they save you. You might want to take much of that chapter with a grain of salt. However advice on not telling police that you live in your car is valid.

Over all, if you are going to live in your car, this is the book to buy on it. Forget A Jane Heim / Archer's books. They don't have a 10th of the information in this book. This book reads a little paranoid, but the practical information you need to survive while living in your car is here. The cold and hot weather survival tips alone make this book worth it.

Craig S. Roberts book: Ten Consecutive Years Living in Cars: is and absolute how to book written for the person who is either already in the process of living in a vehicle or is seriously contemplating it as a lifestyle. He has complete ideas on everything from: privacy, insulation and comfort, showering or bathing, toileting, drinking water retrival, storing your stuff, where to park, successful police encounters, electrical power needs, and finally critical car maintenance. Craig gives you detailed information on each subject, along with his personal observations and experience, and many other options that he has used and thought about. It is the most comprehensive well written book about car living that I've read. I also have lived in my car by choice and find his book a valuable wealth of information. I particularly appreciated his: parking recommendations, how to bath in your car or out of your car in any weather, and how to privatize your car, so no one knows you're in there. I have read Craig's book three times each time gleaning new information.

I read Craig's book 2 years ago, and put many of his suggestions into practice. Although I don't live full time in my minivan, I like to travel on weekends while I hike, bike and sightsee. With the escalating costs of fuel and hotels, and most of us driving large sleepable cars, it is well worth it to take the time to read this book. The author has practicle experience and shares his thoughts willingly. While implementing his suggestions I have never had a problem even in the most remote and problematic locations.

I absulutly loved this book it was the best book i had ever read! I love to hike and everything. I think that John Dunn was awesome and I also think that if u have read this then please tell people aabout this book. Oh yeah his wife had a baby named Laura the same day that the book came out!

Though the book was pretty informative, it gave info on equipment and supplies that are quite outdated. But that's because it was written in 1988.

This book ranks up there with the Really Cool Backcountry Ski Book as an invaluable winter camping reference. It covers all of the bases without getting carried away with technical discussions. There is a great deal of information in this little book, and the authors style is humorous without being irreverant.

August, the first book in Woodward's Aldous Jones trilogy, introduces the Jones family in 1955, when Aldous Rex Llewellyn Jones and his wife Colette are a happy, young married couple with two young children. By 1970, the family, now numbering four children, is facing a series of crises, many of their own making. Author Gerard Woodward, an author who captures scenes and thoughts in unusually vibrant prose filled with unique images and observations, focuses on the domestic life of this family and its interactions, both within the family and within their social milieu.

During the fifteen years of this novel, the Jones family vacations during the month of August in a tent on farmer Hugh Evans's farm in Llanygwynfa, Wales, each chapter representing a different year in the family's life. Life in the tent becomes a microcosm for Woodward's careful examination of family dynamics and change, as the inner lives of the characters are explored in detail. Aldous is an artist and teacher whose education has been subsidized by Lesley Waugh, the brother of Colette, whom Aldous eventually marries. Colette is the primary care giver for Nana, her (and Lesley's) senile mother. Since her siblings feel unable to care for their mother, Colette sometimes has difficulty escaping for a vacation, and on one occasion, she is forced to put her mother into a nursing home.

Janus Jones, Aldous and Colette's eldest son, is brilliant, a boy who eventually develops into a talented student at the Royal Academy of Music. Despite his talent, he remains unsure of his long-term career path. His traumas, his lack of confidence, and his uncertainty about his sexuality color the family dynamics throughout much of the novel, leading to innumerable confrontations. The other children--James, Juliette, and young Julian, sixteen years younger than Janus--pretty much fend for themselves during the crises, occasionally creating issues of their own. Colette escapes into her own world. Ultimately, Aldous must decide whether to continue to vacation in farmer Evans's field or whether that phase of their family life is over.

The novel differs from most other studies of dysfunctional families because the writing is so compelling--filled with thoughtful descriptions, unique imagery, and careful observations, every word perfect. And even though the focus is firmly domestic, without much focus on the world at large (except as the family represents universal problems of all families), Woodward wields his pen like a stiletto, cutting to the quick and exposing the innermost thoughts and feelings of the characters, often with dark humor. While the final novel of the trilogy, A Curious Earth: A Novel, contains much more wry humor and often comes close to being laugh-out-loud funny, August introduces the characters, makes them "real," and firmly establishes Woodward as one of the premier prose stylists writing today. n Mary Whipple

I'll Go to Bed at Noon: A Novel

For fifteen years the Jones family of London spends three weeks of August in a tent in the field of a Welsh farm, Aldous grows from young father to the mature parent of four, each summer etching its own particular memories of a family growing past the easy days of childhood. In August even the predictable is magical, when camping, hiking and biking adventures in Wales are anticipated as a release from everyday concerns, long nights under starry skies, picnic lunches and the routine of the Evans' working farm. Aldous and Colette savor this time; as their family grows, so does the bounty of this environment, far removed from the hustle and bustle of the city, from the financial problems and petty squabbles, an idyllic allotment of time and place untrammeled by progress.

Aldous Jones first flies into Hugh Evans' field in 1955 via a collision with an automobile, separated from his bicycle on impact, landing unhurt in the very place that will become a yearly respite for his family. Evans allows them to annually set up a tent in the field, there to enjoy the beauty and bounty of the lush landscape, a time to rejuvenate and enjoy a simplicity too seldom available in the city. The oldest Jones boy, Janus, is musically gifted; his parents have imagined a stellar career for their exceptional son. Two other boys, James and Julian, and a sister, Juliette, fail to match Janus' promise but are, nonetheless, a contented assemblage of siblings, keeping Colette hopping with the duties and demands of a growing household. But for those three weeks, they all bask in the luxury of an existence hampered by few constraints.

These summers define the Jones family as life intrudes, the children becoming individuals with their own plans, straining against parental oversight: "The thought occurred to Aldous that one's life was a series of little deaths, particularly the life of a child as observed by its parent." An artist and teacher who has filled their London home with paintings of Wales, Aldous has either an enormously generous heart or is too timid to rise to the constant challenges that arise, ever making accommodations for his children and his wife. Janus is the first to rebel, straining against his parents' expectations, Colette all but defeated by her elder son's antipathy. After her mother's death while they are on holiday, Colette develops her own unique set of problems, a gradual unraveling that deeply affects her husband and children, Aldous reluctant to embrace the challenges wrought in his family over the years.

In lyrical prose, in settings both magnanimous and poignant, Woodward captures the essence of the Jones' tribe, the fresh affection for life at its fullest and the attrition of time. This is an intimate view of a family once shining with promise and their love affair with the Welsh countryside, a metaphor for renewal. Like all such liaisons, even this one must end, but not before the reader has participated in a provocative experience, a magnificent landscape where nature absorbs human pain and disappointments into her great beating heart. Luan Gaines/ 2008.