Customer Reviews

Running the Amazon

5 star:		(20)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Somebody had the dubious brainstorm of trying to find the source of the Amazon and follow it from a snowfield in the Peruvian Andes to the Atlantic Ocean. Of course when you're going to do something like that, you want a crackerjack team of people along to help out through the wild and dangerous spots, of which there are probably at least 2500 miles full of those two qualities along the 4200 mile journey. Whoever chose the team was smokin' something, because talk about your ill-assorted multinational party of eleven weirdos. Joe Kane, the sole American, came along as the journalist to document the whole affair - and he'd never paddled a whitewater canoe before in his life. His chances of even living thru the trip, let along being one of the four lone survivors (no, the others didn't all die; don't worry; they dropped out or were uninvited) were less than zero. Yet, improbably, he traveled every mile, even paddling thru wide still waters for days with a raging fever, and reached the Atlantic 6 months after beginning this odyssey.
He has an understated way of writing of his spine-tingling adventures that's particularly suited for high adventure, stuff like extremes of weather, kamikaze bugs, killer rapids, armed guerrillas, fights between the various factions of team members, knee-deep mud, native Indians who'd never seen a white man before (were they cannibals?), cocaine dealers, etc.
I read it twice and then even listened to it on book-on-tape, narrated by Kane himself.
Wonderful. Don't miss it. Then go immediately to your bookstore and buy Tracy Johnston's Shooting the Boh for a woman's take on a similar hairbrained adventure.

This is a story about 10 people who set out to run the Amazon River from the headwaters to the Atlantic Ocean (only 4 of them complete the entire trip). The author does a good job at describing the environment, interactions with the local people, and the adventures they encountered on the trip.

The first 177 pages describe the initial 700 miles of the journey; the other 100 pages describe the remaining 3500 miles of the expedition. When I was about 2/3 of the way through the book and learned that they had 3500 miles left to go, I wondered how the author could do justice to this large segment of travel in only 100 pages. I felt shortchanged. I'm not saying that the book had to be 1000 pages long, but I think that more should have been said about the 3500 miles.

The most exciting part was the whitewater rafting/kayaking through the Acobamba Abyss. Having rafted and kayaked before, I could really identify with their struggles. The author wrote in such a way that I could easily picture what was happening (there were some very intense moments). Being that a number of the team members had very little or no whitewater experience, I'm surprised that they survived this trip.

The author did a good job at describing the interaction among the expedition team members (this really added to the story). However, he was too lenient toward Francois Odendaal. Odendaal did not belong on the river at all and made for a very poor expedition leader.

I'm glad I bought the book. In my opinion, the writing style is good but not great. I did learn a lot about the countries and the people that border the river.

I read "Running the Amazon" because my wife and I were participating in a cruise on the Amazon and an additional two days at the Explorama Lodge, all of our trip at the Peru end of the Amazon, basically in the Iquitos area. Also, my reading tendencies lean toward adventure descriptions, so "Running the Amazon" looked like a book I would finish.

It was so much more than an adventure book, although it certainly was that. - This is a personal description of the first expedition to begin in the snowfields of the Andes, at the continental divide, where the first trickle originates, all the way to the Atlantic - 4200 miles. I can imagine, well almost, how treacherous the white water must have been coming out of the Andes, based on how much water we saw flowing down the Amazon even at the junction of its two major tributaries in Peru where the river officially begins.

The majority of "Running the Amazon" takes place in Peru (even though in total miles the majority of the trip is in Brazil). I would estimate that 50% of the text is about the history of the area, mostly Peru, and the culture, past and present. Also, the author is pretty funny - intentionally or not - in how he describes the adventures of he and his colleagues. I have always wondered about the revolutionary group, Shining Path, and since the book is set in the late 1980s, a good description of the group and its history is provided.

Since Joe Kane is not a man who apparently had been a kayaker, or at least anything approaching a serious kayaker, prior to his journey, it makes his adventures more interesting to the average reader like myself, and this is true also for his descriptions of interpersonal difficulties among some of the expedition.

Because "Running the Amazon" is so well written, and so readable, I am going to read Mr. Kane's other book about the area, "Savages," which describes the difficulties of a group of Ecuadoran people with modern culture. I highly recommend "Running the Amazon."

In 1985 Joe Kane, a writer from San Franciso, along with about ten other individuals from several other countries set out to travel the entire length of the world's longest river. They started at the trickling headwaters of the Amazon in the Peruvian Andes. Nearly seven months and 4,200 miles later, as the river flows into the Atlantic, the group was down to four. Along the way, the group encountered killer rapids, narcotics smugglers, Shining Path geurillas, raging floods and more. This is a readable, exciting book about an epic adventure not likely to be repeated soon. Unfortunately, Kane's account gives short shrift to the latter part of the journey. Roughly two thirds of the narrative describes the first third of the adventure. What is there, however, takes the reader right there, as though along for the journey--from the raging rapids waiting to drown the inexperienced, timorous river runner, to the steaming jungle, to the bugs and snakes, to the almost monotonous routine day after day after day, to the meager existence of those who live along the river. This book is also an interesting case study in leadership and teamwork (or lack thereof) in an epic adventure.

The "Time", or was it "Newsweek", review was wrong. This is an exciting, thrilling adventure full of human drama, insight and a look at a world 99% of US citizens know nothing about. I usually do not read books of this genre, but the "bad" review in one of the country's leading 'news' magazines was intriguing enough for me to order it from my local book store.
I was fascinated by Kane's descriptions of the local citizens in Peru with coca juice running out of their mouths, mile-high canyons where the sun can barely be seen, rebels shooting at them from cliff tops, to supposed head-hunters chasing them on the river.
This is one book where I am glad I did not follow the advice of a "professional" reviewer and ignore it. I enjoyed it so much, I gave my only copy to my mother, who put it into her retirement community's library for others to enjoy.

Joe Kane travels the way most of us dream about it. We all want to travel the entire length of the Amazon in a kayak. If we are lucky we will be able to afford a 4 to 5 day trip on a big passanger boat. He perfectly captures the balance of fun and fear that makes some extreme trips so memorable and reminds us why we are attracted to extreme travel in the first place.

My only gripe about the book is the speed of the narrative. As Kane's trip carried on, he became more hurried to get to his final destination and less interested in pausing to enjoy the environment around him. And as a writer, one senses that he set out to recount everything, but grew impatient and eventually became interested only in getting to the end of his tale. As a result, the early chapters on Peru are detailed and meandering. We don't even get into Brazil until about two thirds of the way through the book. And the final third of the book, from the Peru-Brazil-Colombia border to the Atlantic, whizzes by without a pause, as if the growing speed of the Amazon's current were forcing Kane's narrative forward at an ever faster pace until he finally reaches Belem. There were logistical reasons why Kane was in a hurry, but I was left wishing he had taken the time to pause and meander a little bit more in the lower Amazon.

This is the book that finally got me out the door. After I read it, I took off for Brazil. And lawdy do I love it there.

Running the Amazon one of my favorite travel books because it is a great travel book. It understands that adventure is participating in the world not merely viewing niagra falls. It doesn't wax poetic about sights, but looks at travel as a way to meet people in intense situations, a way to look at life from different glasses, a way to reinvent who you are (and everyone should do that at least once every three or four years). As Oscar Wilde said "Consistency is the last refuge of the unimaginative.

I heard Joe Kane describe his trip on NPR's "Fresh Air" by Terry Gross. Joe Kane was so engaging that I immediately ordered the book. Joe Kane originally signed up with the expedition to chronicle the trip. The expedition planning can be described as haphazard and due to a shortage of people, Joe Kane ended up on the river. Joe Kane and Piotr Chmielinski, the famous Polish kayaker known as "El Polacko" in the South American countries, were the only two members of the expedition to paddle the whole river. Jerome Truran and Kate Durrant supported the two after they all finished the severe whitewater. The story is so intense that I could only read one chapter at a sitting. I wanted to take the time to reflect on the action and the events. The story is amazing. The whitewater, the expedition members, the Sendero Luminiso revolutionaries, the weather, and the natives are all part of the trip. It is important to remember that Joe Kane had very little river experience and he had no idea that he would be on the river at the start of the trip. You will understand the river experience from an author who was truly awed.

If it isn't already, Joe Kane's RUNNING THE AMAZON will definitely become a real classic in travel and adventure lit. Among the many travel narratives out there, this is one of the best you will find.

Kane was invited along on a half-baked expedition to run the length of the Amazon river, from its' Andean source to it's broad end at the Atlantic Ocean. After hiking across the continental divide from the Pacific side of Peru (trekking alongside the Rio Colca gorge, the deepest outside of the Himalayas), the descent begins.

Along the way, the splintering expedition dodges falling rocks in cleft gorges, narcotrafficers, Maoist rebels, storms and other assorted hazards along the way. Kane's descriptions of the journey, and every stop along the way, are remarkably vivid, doing what every great travel book should do, but so few actually do.

An unforgettable account of an admirable trip; highly recommended.

-David Alston

What a wonderful, thrilling, adventure-packed, suspense-filled book! It has everything, even a love story. Well written, as the author shares all his feelings, hurts, thoughts. And vividly outlines his fellow members of the expedition. Much is learned, also, of Peru and Brazil.