Author: Don Lago
Publisher: University of Iowa Press
ISBN: 1587294834
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 289
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Book Description
When his father developed Alzheimer’s disease, Don Lago realized that the stories and traditions of his Swedish ancestors would be lost along with the rest of his father’s memories. Haunted by this inevitable tragedy, Lago set out to fight back against forgetting by researching and reclaiming his long-lost Scandinavian roots. Beginning his quest with a visit to his ancestral home of Gränna, Sweden, Lago explores all facets of Scandinavian America—Swedish, Danish, Finnish, Norwegian, and Icelandic—along the way. He encounters Icelanders living in the Utah desert, a Titanic victim buried beneath a gigantic Swedish coffee pot in Iowa, an Arkansas town named after the famous Swedish opera singer Jenny Lind, a real-life Legoland in southern California, and other unique remnants of America’s Scandinavian past. Visits to Sigurd Olson’s legendary cabin on the banks of Burntside Lake in the Boundary Waters of Minnesota and Carl Sandburg’s birthplace in Galesburg, Illinois, further provide Lago with an acute sense of the Scandinavian values that so greatly influenced, and continue to influence, American society. More than just a travel memoir, On the Viking Trail places Scandinavian immigrants and their history within the wider sweep of American culture. Lago’s perceptive eye and amusing tales remind readers of all ethnic backgrounds that to truly appreciate America one must never forget its immigrant past.
Author: Lawrence Millman
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
ISBN: 9780618082483
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 260
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Book Description
A classic of northern exploration and adventure, LAST PLACES is Lawrence Millman's marvelously told account of his journey along the ancient Viking sea routes that extend from Norway to Newfoundland. Traveling through landscapes of transcendent desolation, Millman wandered by way of the Shetland Islands, the Faeroes, Iceland, Greenland, and Labrador. His way was marked by surprising human encounters--with a convicted murderer in Reykjavik, an Inuit hermit in Greenland, an Icelandic guide who leads him to a place called Hell, and a Newfoundlander who warns him about the local variant of the Abominable Snowman. By turns earthy and lyrical, LAST PLACES is an ebullient celebration of the exotic North.
Author: Neil Price
Publisher: Basic Books
ISBN: 0465096999
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 629
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Book Description
The definitive history of the Vikings -- from arts and culture to politics and cosmology -- by a distinguished archaeologist with decades of expertise The Viking Age -- from 750 to 1050 -- saw an unprecedented expansion of the Scandinavian peoples into the wider world. As traders and raiders, explorers and colonists, they ranged from eastern North America to the Asian steppe. But for centuries, the Vikings have been seen through the eyes of others, distorted to suit the tastes of medieval clerics and Elizabethan playwrights, Victorian imperialists, Nazis, and more. None of these appropriations capture the real Vikings, or the richness and sophistication of their culture. Based on the latest archaeological and textual evidence, Children of Ash and Elm tells the story of the Vikings on their own terms: their politics, their cosmology and religion, their material world. Known today for a stereotype of maritime violence, the Vikings exported new ideas, technologies, beliefs, and practices to the lands they discovered and the peoples they encountered, and in the process were themselves changed. From Eirík Bloodaxe, who fought his way to a kingdom, to Gudrid Thorbjarnardóttir, the most traveled woman in the world, Children of Ash and Elm is the definitive history of the Vikings and their time.
Author: Malcolm Buckley
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 138
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Book Description
'A must for all who have loved and lost their best friend and loyal companion' The Viking Way is a challenging long distance footpath in the UK, and runs 147 miles from The Humber Bridge to Oakham in the County of Rutland. My pilgrimage along this amazing footpath in June 2019, spanned 12 consecutive days. The purpose of the walk was to assist in my 'coming to terms' with the loss of my Chocolate Labrador 'Denver' in June 2018. During the nine months following Denver's passing, I nearly left this life 3 times...by choice, the devastation his loss created took me down into the deepest, darkest depths of despair. The level of grief I experienced in losing Denver was absolute, and beyond anything I'd ever known. Carrying Denver's collar in my backpack, here is the record of the outer physical challenges I encountered on the trail, and to an equal degree the deeper inner battle of the journey through my complicated, unresolved grief. An emotional roller coaster that takes the reader into the depths of complicated grief, and yet the love, joy and happiness our dogs bring into our lives shines through.
Author: Mary Elizabeth Nelson
Publisher: Orca Book Publishers
ISBN: 1459800591
Category : Juvenile Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 192
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Book Description
In the fall of 1066, a thirteen-year-old Anglo-Saxon girl named Catla watches from afar as Viking raiders burn her village and imprison her family and the other villagers. No one sees her as she flees toward Aigber, the closest village, praying the people there will help. Catla must ignore her terror as she makes her way to the standing stones, a place of refuge, where she meets Sven, an older boy from her village. Together, they continue toward Aigber and are able to alert the village of the coming peril. Catla and Sven rally the villagers of Aigber, and with Catla's help, a plan is put in place that will save both villages from the Nord-devils.
Author: Judson Roberts
Publisher: Judson Roberts
ISBN: 0578076438
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 308
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Book Description
He's the son of a chieftain and a princess--yet Halfdan was born a slave. Now he is becoming a man and it is time for him to meet his destiny. Though raised a slave who could only dream of freedom, young Halfdan's fate may be about to change. If freed, he may train as a Viking warrior, and come to know the glories of true brotherhood and the horrors of unspeakable evil. In the world of Vikings, a warrior's destiny is forged in the heat of battle. If the fates decree it, Hafdan may emerge as a new hero . . . a new myth . . . and perhaps a new legend.
Author: National Geographic Society (U.S.)
Publisher: National Geographic Books
ISBN: 1426215649
Category : Illustrated books
Languages : en
Pages : 324
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Book Description
"Plan where, when, and how to plot your adventure with National Geographic's worldwide network of travel experts and insider tips from locals"--Cover.
Author: Kyle Rohrig
Publisher: Createspace Independent Publishing Platform
ISBN: 9781514747568
Category : Appalachian Trail
Languages : en
Pages : 322
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Book Description
Join Kyle and his little dog "Katana" as they take you along for every step of their 2,185 mile adventure hiking the entire Appalachian Trail. Confront the terrain, severe weather, injury, dangerous wildlife and questionable characters as you grow and learn as Kyle did from start to finish of this epic adventure. Make some friends for life, learn the finer points of long distance hiking, and realize that what you take within your backpack is not nearly as important as what you bring within yourself... This exciting and often times humorous narrative does more than simply tell the story of Kyle and Katana's adventures on trail. You will be inspired, while learning what it takes mentally and physically to accomplish an undertaking such as hiking thousands of miles through mountainous wilderness while braving countless obstacles all determined to make you quit. Nobody said it was easy, but if you can make it to the end, your life will be changed forever. What are you waiting for? Adventure is calling...For more content from the Author, as well as to follow his past, present, and future adventures; check out the following pages!Website/Blog: BoundlessRoamad.comInstagram: @_roamad_Facebook: facebook.com/kyle.rohrig.7Youtube: youtube.com/c/NomadWisdom
Author: Barney Scout Mann
Publisher: Mountaineers Books
ISBN: 1680513222
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 389
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Book Description
2020 Banff Mountain Book Competition Finalist in Adventure Travel In Journeys North, legendary trail angel, thru hiker, and former PCTA board member Barney Scout Mann spins a compelling tale of six hikers on the Pacific Crest Trail in 2007 as they walk from Mexico to Canada. This ensemble story unfolds as these half-dozen hikers--including Barney and his wife, Sandy--trod north, slowly forming relationships and revealing their deepest secrets and aspirations. They face a once-in-a-generation drought and early severe winter storms that test their will in this bare-knuckled adventure. In fact, only a third of all the hikers who set out on the trail that year would finish. As the group approaches Canada, a storm rages. How will these very different hikers, ranging in age, gender, and background, respond to the hardship and suffering ahead of them? Can they all make the final 60-mile push through freezing temperatures, sleet, and snow, or will some reach their breaking point? Journeys North is a story of grit, compassion, and the relationships people forge when they strive toward a common goal.
Author: Lori Erickson
Publisher: Fortress Press
ISBN: 1506420729
Category : Travel
Languages : en
Pages : 256
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Book Description
"Whether describing mystical visions or the rhythms of everyday life, Erickson turns the spiritual journey into a series of exciting transformations." ÑPublishers WeeklyÊ(starred review) From her childhood on an Iowa farm, Lori Erickson grew up to travel the world as a writer specializing in holy sitesjourneys that led her on an ever-deepening spiritual quest. InÊHoly Rover, she weaves her personal narrative with descriptions of a dozen pilgrimages. Along the way, Erickson encounters spiritual leaders who include the chief priest of the Icelandic pagan religion of Asatru, a Trappist monk at Thomas Merton's Gethsemani Abbey, and a Lakota retreat director at South Dakota's Bear Butte. Both irreverent and devout,ÊHoly RoverÊincludes images of holy sites around the world taken by several of the nation's leading travel photographers. Travel writer, Episcopal deacon, and author of the Holy Rover blog atÊPatheos, Erickson is an engaging guide for pilgrims eager to take a spiritual journey. Her book describes travels that changed her life and can change yours, too.
