Into Thick Air: Biking to the Bellybutton of Six Continents [NOOK Book]

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Overview

With plenty of sunscreen and a cold beer swaddled in his sleeping bag, writer and botanist Jim Malusa bicycled alone to the lowest point on each of six continents, a six-year series of “anti-expeditions” to the “anti-summits.” His journeys took him to Lake Eyre in the arid heart of Australia, along Moses’ route to the Dead Sea, and from Moscow to the Caspian Sea. He pedaled across the Andes to Patagonia, around tiny Djibouti in the Horn of Africa, and from Tucson to Death Valley. With a scientist’s eye, he vividly observes local landscapes and creatures. As a lone man, he is overfed by grandmothers, courted by ladies of the night in Volgograd, invited into a mosque by Africa’s most feared tribe, chased by sandstorms and
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Overview

With plenty of sunscreen and a cold beer swaddled in his sleeping bag, writer and botanist Jim Malusa bicycled alone to the lowest point on each of six continents, a six-year series of “anti-expeditions” to the “anti-summits.” His journeys took him to Lake Eyre in the arid heart of Australia, along Moses’ route to the Dead Sea, and from Moscow to the Caspian Sea. He pedaled across the Andes to Patagonia, around tiny Djibouti in the Horn of Africa, and from Tucson to Death Valley. With a scientist’s eye, he vividly observes local landscapes and creatures. As a lone man, he is overfed by grandmothers, courted by ladies of the night in Volgograd, invited into a mosque by Africa’s most feared tribe, chased by sandstorms and hurricanes — yet Malusa keeps riding. His reward: the deep silence of the world’s great depressions. A large-hearted narrative of what happens when a friendly, perceptive American puts himself at the mercy of strange landscapes and their denizens, Into Thick Air presents one of the most talented new voices in contemporary travel writing.

Editorial Reviews

Kirkus Reviews
Delightful debut travelogue by botanist Malusa, who cycled to the lowest point on each of six continents. This peculiar quest sent him along routes connecting areas as diverse as Cairo and the Dead Sea, the Australian outback and Lake Eyre. Though Malusa personally devised each of his six expeditions (he traversed every continent except Antarctica), the Discovery Channel Online paid him to carry a satellite telephone and transmit blogs of his travels. Rather than simply a collection of these blogs, his book tells the full story behind them. Riding a bicycle made Malusa much more vulnerable to his surroundings than the average traveler; it lowered his expectations for food and lodging, thereby connecting him with each region's least privileged residents. Locals from Darwin to Djibouti constantly approached him, offering tea or pastries or just respite from the elements. They were probably responding to the same likable quality that comes across in Malusa's text. Whether describing a visit with a Bedouin family in the Egyptian desert, a hitchhiking journey with road-kill gourmands in the remotest parts of Australia or a chat with gauchos while trying to escape the brutal Patagonian wind, he always seems well-informed and outgoing. Russia's icy autumn sent him scurrying into lofty but empty old hotels along the route from Moscow to the Caspian Sea, a remarkably untouristed region in which he marveled at the vestiges of communism and joined two lively wedding parties. Malusa wears his expertise as a botanist lightly here, mentioning flora and fauna but detailing the full panoply of his impressions. This dense yet desultory account moves quickly, never lingering on any encounter for more thana few sentences, no matter how juicy. It's not as informative as the works of Bill Bryson, but easily as funny. Steeped in sarcasm and alive to the irony of any situation, observant and wry, omnivorous in the scope of its details and utterly subjective.

Product Details

  • ISBN-13: 9781578051847
  • Publisher: Sierra Club Books
  • Publication date: 7/1/2010
  • Sold by: Barnes & Noble
  • Format: eBook
  • Pages: 336
  • Sales rank: 446,651
  • File size: 1 MB

Meet the Author

Jim Malusa has reported on many assignments for The Discovery Channel, including travels to Mount Pinatubo in the Philippines, the Atacama Desert in Chile, caves in Alaska, and Three Gorges Dam in China. He has also written for numerous magazines and newspapers, including Natural History, the Las Vegas Sun, and the Arizona Daily Star. With a Ph.D. in Biology from the University of Arizona, he conducts fieldwork on desert plants for the university and the National Park Service, when he is not traveling the world or writing about his adventures.

Table of Contents

Introduction An Odd Character in the Bush 1

Australia

Ch. 1 Tucson to Darwin: A Wonderful Place to Bring Your Ex-Wife 11

Ch. 2 Darwin to Lake Eyre: Bloody Big Stretch of Salt 17

Asia

Ch. 3 Tucson to Cairo: We Cannot Guarantee Your Safety 57

Ch. 4 Cairo to the Dead Sea: Do Not Forget That You Are in a Holy Place 74

Europe

Ch. 6 Tucson to Moscow: Once in Russia There Was No Rich and No Poor 115

Ch. 6 Moscow to the Caspian Sea: Special Training for Survival 124

South America

Ch. 7 Tucson to Puerto Montt: It All Comes on Ships 163

Ch. 8 Puerto Montt to Salina Grande: This Wind Is Just an Everyday Wind 170

Africa

Ch. 9 Tucson to Djibouti Town: Usually in Afternoon We Are Eating the Khat 209

Ch. 10 Djibouti Town to Lac Assal: Nobody Has Come on a Bicycle 231

North America

Ch. 11 Tucson: That Sounds Just Awful 265

Ch. 12 Tucson to Death Valley: Way Down in That Hole Where There Ain't No Noise 269

Epilogue 311

Acknowledgments 313

Bicycle Touring and Books 315

About the Author 321

Customer Reviews

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