You know, anyone with a car can travel cross-country on the highway system. But how about making the trip by boat? It may be hard to believe, but the old river system is still traversable - well, mostly. Here and there, author and traveler William Least Heat-Moon did have to "portage" his craft from one free-flowing section of a waterway to another, towing it along those same land-based concrete and asphalt byways most of us experience daily.
But his adventure across America's heartland, through big cities and small towns, past skyscrapers and shacks, meandering through forested lands at times and open prairie at others, gave him lots of interesting tales to tell. His classics Blue Highways and PrairyErth, coupled with this title, indicate he has a love of travel and a way of seeing the possibilities that most of us don't even notice in our path. Departing from Newark Bay at Elizabeth, New Jersey, Heat-Moon and his copilot nicknamed "Pilotis" head for New York City and the East River. From there, they plan to make it all the way to the Pacific Ocean at the mouth of the Columbia River aboard the Nikawa - named from Osage words for river (ni) and horse (kawa), and pronounded Nee-KAH-wah.
With little side trips in their canoe, the two men manage to visit lots of small towns along the way. They get in some good fishing, come near to disaster too many times, and bond like men are supposed to do on such a venture.
If you like "armchair travel" tales, you'll love this visit to all the sights and sounds (and smells, too) that go with such a journey. The Missouri River wanders through major cities like St. Louis (where jazz still rides the wind) and Sioux City (Iowa). But it doesn't always cooperate. As Heat-Moon reports, a sentence he came across while doing research of the days of paddlewheelers, said it all:
A Bit of History Thrown In
But travel tales are not all about easy going. Sometimes it's the hardships and bending to Nature that make for the best memories. Speaking of memories, Heat-Moon sprinkles what he calls "Iconograms" throughout the book. These are long quotes taken from the written journals/records of other explorers, such as George Catlin in 1841. These excerpts from the past and Heat-Moon's own excellent eye for panoramic detail made his River-Horse a bestseller.
 |
Go To Page: 1 2
