Return to story

The individualist and the hiker Christmas books for the armchair adventurer

December 3, 2005 12:50 am

I N ARMY BASIC TRAINING, long ago, there was a grizzled old sergeant whose favorite put-down was to scream at some offender: "Whaddya think ya are? Some kinda individjul ?"

I wonder what the old guy would think in today's world, where team playing isn't just important, it's everything--key to jobs, promotions, college admissions and many a trophy and accolade. And is, of course, heavily featured in those new U.S. Army recruiting ads.

But the world has always had a place for that "individjul," even if many of them have a tough time finding their slot in life.

Alan Tennant certainly had no trouble finding his niche. His incredible tale of chasing peregrine falcons across the Western Hemisphere is faithfully chronicled in "On the Wing: To the Edge of the Earth With the Peregrine Falcon."

Tennant could just as easily have called his story "The Individualist," as the reader is bound to wonder as much about the author as the incredible falcons that he follows. The name, peregrine, he relates, tells much about this swiftest of birds that wander across and between continents.

Helping out in a falcon research project on the Gulf Coast of Texas, Tennant hooks up with another colorful character, an aging master aviator of the human variety. The two men run afoul of the law and the U.S. Army and head off north in a battered Cessna Skyhawk to track the migration of a young female falcon they dub "Amelia."

Stand there with him, now, alone on a lonely windswept beach, as he deals with a frightened falcon he has captured in order to attach a miniature transmitter to her:

"Closer, though, all I could see were her eyes. Huge and unworldly, they stared up like those of some small, ferocious angel, astonished at her sudden inability to spire away. Vision was her armor, her strength against world, and the force burning from her face so transfixed me that, oblivious, I reached to touch her. Affronted at my advance, the peregrine wrenched onto her back and with a reptilian hiss snatched my hand in her untethered foot. She had not taken her eyes from my face, and her speed and accuracy at seizing a different target were so astonishing it took a second for me to realize she'd pierced my hand."

This has been a year for good nature writing, but no one, I believe, does it better than Alan Tennant. Suffice to say, "On the Wing" is high on my list of Christmas gift books.

Second on that list is something entirely different. And since I have yet to put together my own guidebook to the best trails in our region, I have to recommend the next best thing, Nathan Lott's "60 Hikes Within 60 Miles--Richmond, Including Petersburg, Williamsburg and Fredericksburg."

These state and regional hiking guidebooks just get better and better. And Lott, a Richmond hiker and writer, has used all the best, most helpful features and graphic assists in this new book.

Although this is a Richmond-centered guide, there are just enough trails in our part of Virginia to make it worth buying. OK, OK, so here are "our" footpaths covered within: Caledon Natural Area, Fredericksburg Canal Park Trail, Motts Run Reservoir, Lake Anna State Park, Spotsylvania Court House Battlefield, George Washington Birthplace National Monument, Voorhees Nature Preserve and Westmoreland State Park.

Now as any serious seeker-of-trails in Central Virginia certainly knows, this is far from an inclusive listing. But the hikes are well-chosen, and the information on each is well-presented.

Lott's guidebook nicely fills the need I often hear about for an introduction to some of the better-known trails in this part of the state.

Farther afield--like about 2,000 miles farther--is the focus of Steve Miller's new odyssey: "The Grand: The Colorado River in the Grand Canyon, a Photo Journey."

I think it's fair to say you probably couldn't count the number of beautiful photo books dealing with Arizona's famous fissure. Miller's is at least as good as the best, as he, like so many others struggles to convey the simply overwhelming mystery and majesty of the canyon.

Has anyone ever grown bored with the Canyon? How could they? It has limitless views, limitless faces and unlimited moods. The vast majority see it solely from its upper rims, north and south. Each year, a few thousand hike into it and a few thousand others travel down its waters. Those who spend enough time in it never forget it and a high percentage of them find some way to return.

Whether it is in his micro images of the canyon's small things and rocks or in sweeping panoramas, Miller, who has rafted the canyon more than a dozen times, has produced a collection anyone would treasure.

I do have one other small suggestion for Christmas book-giving. It is another guidebook, this one dealing with the truly remarkable multiflora of our tree life--"Trees and Shrubs of Virginia" by Oscar W. Gupton and Fred C. Swope.

Long on the look for such a book, I came across my copy used at the Wounded Book Shop on Amelia Street. If it happens not to be available in print from the publisher, University Press of Virginia in Charlottesville, I'm sure it wouldn't be too hard to find used.

And speaking of secondhand books, all true book lovers should know that we have several really good used book stores in the Fredericksburg area now. I hit one or two of them every week. As every hard-core book browser knows, you truly never know what will turn up in these places. And the Wounded Book Shop even offered me a cup of tea while I browsed. A welcoming touch.

PAUL SULLIVAN, a former reporter with The Free Lance-Star, is a freelance writer living in Spotsylvania County. Contact him by mail at The Free Lance-Star, 616 Amelia St., Fredericksburg, Va. 22401; or by e-mail at
Email: PBSullivan2@cs.com.