What price for enjoyment?

[guest24]

After watching 'Living with Monkeys' on the BBC recently, I was captivated by the demeanour of the chap Guy Grieve. Investigation shows he has written a book - 'Call of the wild', so named as homage to Jack London.

Found the book for sale on play.com for an extortionate £6.99 for an author I knew nothing about. So, I bought it anyway along with Jack London's book of the same name.

Seven quid I thought, for a paperback, what is the world coming to? So expensive just for a paperback book that had been reduced from £9 already - will it be any good?

Well, after having finished reading it I have come to the merry conclusion that 7 quid for a book that has given me many many hours of thorough enjoyment is excellent value for money. That price buys me one cinema ticket that is good for one film once. Or, less than 2 gallons of fuel. Hmm.

So I realise that book prices, when the book is good, are really quite good value for money/enjoyment!

For those interested in the book (all about him living a bit wild in Alaska for a year), here is a link to it
http://www.play.com/Books/Books/4-/1611848/Call-of-the-Wild/Product.html

[Richard]

I read it and decided that the man was a complete prat, willing to abandon his wife and young family to "find himself".  He then proceeded to leach off an Alaskan family without which he appears unlikely to have made it through.

Didn't impress me anyway.

Richard

[themoudie]

He then proceeded to leach off an Alaskan family without which he appears unlikely to have made it through.

Didn't impress me anyway.

Richard

Family surname Palin, by any chance?

[guest24]

Oh I agree he was a prat, and if it hadn't been for the fact that I had seen him on TV I would have assumed him to have perished several times during his adventure due to stupidity whilst I was reading the book. Where were his fundamental bushcraft skills, like finding water....they were missing!

I found it interesting as an insight into the Alaskan winter, the native people, huskies, the Yukon etc.

I find it hard enough leaving SWMBO and my 4 drains on my resources each day I go to work, so I could never cope away from them for a year!! Though I have managed a week away before now.

[guest7]

Parenthood is an interesting thing isn't it? There was a time I'm sure I would have jumped at the chance of a year living rough somewhere (except perhaps an underpass in cardiff city centre), but these days I find that a lot of my decisions are made with regard to how they will affect my wife and children.

I'm not proud of my slightly selfish parenting past, but at least I'm getting a crack at doing it better this time. Biking is fundamentally a solo activity, but it's up to me to find ways of combining my hobby with my kids and wife.

As for these boys own adventure types, I sometimes wonder if they have considered the challenges they could face closer to home. How far do you have to go to find yourself? A few years ago I read a book by a guy called John Hillaby called (iirc) 'A walk through Britain'. He walked the length of the island, living rough when required. He had experiences aplenty, but I suspect this wouldn't be an exciting enough prospect for the MTV generation.

GC

[guest295]

There's a show on telly here called 'Man vs Wild', which features a complete prat who, with only two camera crews, a sound crew and the necessary support vehicles and caterers, goes to some place where he can fall in muck, chew on stuff and make the simplest tasks look difficult. Can't imagine why anyone watches, but apparently some do.
Terry

[Andy M]

As for these boys own adventure types, I sometimes wonder if they have considered the challenges they could face closer to home.

GC

What's the reward? Why are people doing this sort of thing?

There are two extremes of the traveller IMHO. One has a head full of questions, some of which can only be answered by doing. Proper immersion in another culture can I think have some really positive results in terms of prejudice and an ability to deal better with lifes little upsets. Simply working with German and Dutch guys for example has made me rather less likely to buy the SUN and rather more likely to adopt a laid back approach to airport or other travel hassles. I've never been anywhere that I'd really support us bombing for example (Manchester comes close though), so perhaps the world may be a little more peaceful if more people met face to face. You can't meet a genuine French Farmer, German soldier or Tuareg Tribesman in the UK unless they come to you and we have the wealth to go to a lot more of the world than can come to us.

The other sort of traveller is the one who usually starts with the book title. The plan to be able to claim bragging rights to being (these days) the first Taurean Plumber to ride a 2007 CBR900 to the North Cape in August seems to lead to an expectation that they are so special that the world has to help in their goal. These are the clowns that take the ****. The UK is so well mapped out few find challenges they'd consider big enough in the UK unless they get into a sport.

Life is about priorites. I'm pretty certain I'll never get to a RTW trip as I'd like to. It's sort of disapointing until you look at what else takes priority. There are certainly things you can do in the UK to keep an interest up without resorting to leaving kids a parent short etc. so I will do those, but the bigger trips still excite when viewed alone.

Andy