Customer Reviews

Into a Desert Place: A 3000 Mile Walk around the Coast of Baja California

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4 star:		(4)
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1 star:		(1)

 

 

Travel books about daring trips to places filled with hardships erupt like volcanic ash from the "featured on sale" sections of bookstores. Authors fill the shelves, as they have for a dozen decades, with endless sagas of how they climbed-a-mountain-and-everybody-died, why they sailed-the-Pacific-in-a-sea-of-storms, and even all-the-good-reasons-why-people-should-not-do-the-dangerous-pastime-the-author-does.

"Into a Desert Place" features many of the hallmarks of this unfortunate genre of "we nearly died" non-fiction. Baja California's alien landscapes, spiked with impassable mountains, rattlesnakes and boojum trees, certainly qualifies in many regions as a "need a sense of high adventure and a contempt for danger to tour there" area. Yet, "Into a Desert Place" does not repel in the way that "body count on Mount Everest" books can. On the contrary, this book simply charms. "Into a Desert Place" is a complete revelation--an accessible, winning account of how adverse conditions can be met by those most basic values--determination, a good attitude and, indeed, a good heart.

Mr. Mackintosh manages to convey the hardships of the trip, the kindness of most of the people he met along the way, and his own struggles to complete his quest, all without undue sentimentality or boastfulness. The book has a folksy, simple feel about it, but it is anything but a simple book. Instead of the usual travel book conceits based on machismo or "sheer pluck", we see Baja through the eyes of Everyman. We need more books like "Into a Desert Place" and fewer books about how many innocent tourists drowned at sea. We all belong in the desert place to which this book removes us. After reading this book, the reader may not wish to walk around Baja, but the reader might well wish to find that place of quiet, and think a bit.

I bought this book years ago, after reading a typewritten review in one of those "Doomsday Is Comming--Soon!" 'zines. Most of the books reviewed in it were those grim tomes about how to survive by eating nuts and berries after The Big One gets dropped and wipes out 50% of our population. Mr. McKintosh's book proved to be a pleasant suprise--a well- written account, an out-and-out adventure, a walk across the remote desert of Lower California on a shoestring budget.

When he got the idea to actually Do It, McKinstosh was slightly pudgy Scottish college professor whose main exercise seemed to have been lifting a bottle of beer to his lips while he watched football (that's soccer to us Yanks) on the telly. By the time he completed his several month journey, he was lean and sun-baked, the antithesis of his former couch potato self.

In the process, I'd say Mr. McKintosh grew, and actually "found the handle". He figured out what he was about, and what he wanted to do with his life.

For me, some of the most enjoyable parts were those describing how he begged equipment from manufacturers and outfitters, and how he raised funding along the way by writing accounts that he posted to newspapers and magazines.

Of course, there's The Adventure itself, including an amusing account of how he got sloshed from booze he obtained from gathering whiskey bottles that had washed ashore after being thrown overboard from cruise ships. (He sagely notes that staggering around in the boonies at night is risky business.)

Along the way, McKintosh gets befriended by all sorts of interesting, impoverished, and invariably generous folk. Those accounts have a Beginner's Mind freshness to them as well.

Since his original trek, McKinstosh has acquired a modicum of fame. He lectures and writes for the Baja Travel Club, and has since written another book about a second journey with a burro for company. That's a nice piece as well, but I prefer the freshness that only comes from seeing things for the first time.

I'm an old Baja hand myself, and over the years, I've collected a lot of books about Lower California. This one ranks at the very top.

So buy it, read it, and enjoy the photographs. I'm sure you'll find the money well spent.

A British "every man" who describes himself as being a self absorbed couch potato, walks alone around the rugged and remote coastlines of Baja California. The self-deprecating honesty and insight is unusual and refreshing. He persists through heat and drought, rock slides and dangerous tides, scorpions and thorny plants, daunting geological impediments, rattlesnakes, and sharks -- yet the story is more 'man in nature' than the more common and inane 'man against nature.'
Mackintosh's sensitivity to the lands he interacts with is fascinating, particularly given that he is afoot in a 'wild' land a hemisphere from his home, in an environment foreign to his previous life. "I didn't need anyone to tell me what was right and wrong. The land was sacred to me. I was a part of it. I wasn't one of a million careless tourists with their trucks, bikes and polluting toys. I was one in a million. The desert was special and my needs were special. There was no conflict. ... The sense of being special to a special place was very much part of the exhilaration and the experience. ... Yet, to put it into words was to distort it. The feeling was the reality and the mystery. It saddened me to think that I might never be able to share it with another person. 'In what concerns you much,' wrote Thoreau, 'know that you are alone in the world.'" Relevant recountings of historical events are woven into the narrative, as are the author's spiritual musings.
The whole-heartedness with which Mackintosh merges into a new landscape is complimented by the friendships which he easily forges with the ranchers and fishermen of rural and wild Baja, and their families. As a journal of wilderness travel, this may be one of the best books written in the twentieth century.

I originally read this book several years back and now find myself periodically rereading it as its a spiritual journey packaged in a travel adventure. I dream of doing something like it however will probably not. If you like "cultural experiences" with the locals where you travel to you will love this book.

This book totally captivated me. I was familiar with most of the areas traveled and found him to be right on target with his descriptions. I love Baja and enjoyed learning the experiences he encountered and how he tackled all the many hardships he faced.

This story is so wonderfully refreshing when compared to the many stories of adventure travel on the market today. If you like the unusual in travel, then this will be a fun book as the author takes you along on his 3,000 mile trek around Baha California relating the story in his own, uncomplicated style. You'll feel just like you are walking beside him, as he encounters, rattlesnakes, scorpions, cactus thorns, thirst, hunger and lonliness. You'll rejoice with him as he comes upon the many small fishing camps along the way and meets wonderful, friendly local fisherman who share their meager food and water with him so he can continue onward. The highlight of travel is often those you meet along the way and this story is no exception. For a first-time author, he does an exceptional job in relating this story in a simple, understandable way, just as if he was talking with you personally. It's truly remarkable that a person with no previous hiking or trekking experience could pull of such a feat. His determination and upbeat attitude pushed him to the conclusion of his quest. If you like travel and adventure, this is a good one.

Graham exposes Baja in a way very few people will experience the Baja peninsula. I have spent the last 10 years exploring and traveling this unknown part of Mexico and I realize how little I know about Baja California.

Where are you now Graham MacKintosh??

A TOP RATING from me. I have met and spoken with Graham Mackintosh at one of his slide shows. He is qualified to write this work because:
- He had never done anything like this before
- He was not a hiker and has red hair and fair-skin (bad in Baja)
- He had no money
- He did not know Spanish (bad news when in Baja)
- He had more enthusiasm than good sense
- He is an excellent writer

Interested already? You should be. Graham hiked thousands of miles around Lower California alone with almost no resources. He did take pictures and kept a careful diary: thus the book.

I will not tell you about the hoard of blue crabs (in the initial stage of his journey) and how he almost died at their hands (claws?). You will have to read the book.

A bonus is that Graham gives us his thoughts and emotions during the journey, as well as the unique people, sights and scenes he encountered. His reactions and how he handles them powerfully convey the loneliness and starkness of the Baja setting. It is a landscape all its own, truly larger than life as we may know it.

I don't recommend readily - this book I HIGHLY RECOMMEND.

"Into A Desert Place" is a must-read for anyone who loves Baja California or is planning to visit there. We intensely enjoyed Graham's irrepressible quest for adventure and evocative descriptions of the astonishing land, sea, people, creatures, and history of Baja. He must have had an angel on his shoulder to survive the many dangers to which he was exposed during his arduous trek across the harsh and sparsely inhabited Baja landscape. His excellent sense of humor makes light of his travails, and this added greatly to our pleasure in reading his book. His writing resonated with our own many joyous and elemental memories of Baja.

What a great read. This is an inspiring story that lead me to buy Graham's other books. If you love adventure and/or Baja California, you'll love this book.