Product Description

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #429277 in Books
• Published on: 2007-10-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 432 pages

Features

• ISBN13: 9781841621739
• Condition: NEW
• Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark.
• Click here to view our Condition Guide and Shipping Prices

From the Back Cover
The world's greatest river flows from its source high in the Peruvian Andes through mountains, cloudforest and lush rainforest to its final destination on Brazil's eastern shores. Long associated with exploration and adventure, the Amazon is also rightly treasured for its biodiversity.
Whether you are taking a leisurely riverboat trip or organizing your own expedition, wish to learn about the area's flora and fauna or the people living along the river's route, this book is invaluable.
This guide includes: all countries of the Amazon Basin and Orinoco; detailed natural history and expanded sections on national parks; revised information on tours, hotels, lodges, restaurants and attractions; towns with the best access to the river; new appendix of internet resources.

About the Author

Customer Reviews

Well worth the money; an excellent guide and resource
As an author who has published two guidebooks myself (and as a critical reader and user of guidebooks), I highly recommend Harris and Hutchison's The Amazon. This book is really two guides in one: Practical advice on where to go, where to stay, what to see and do, etc. and a valuable natural history companion. Biologist Roger Harris provides fascinating and highly readable information about the flora, fauna, and cultures you may encounter in a well-organized fashion. Not to mention thumbnail sketches of history, climate, language, health issues and other subjects of interest. The writing is rich enough to classify it as armchair travel but the hard information provided makes it practical and well worth the reasonable investment. We bought it before our trip, used it extensively during the expedition, and still refer to it now that we are home. As a writer, I'm envious of the product; as a reader I'm satisfied.

BEST IN CLASS, THOUGH NOT THAT GOOD
Among all guidebooks I have seen on the Amazon, this one did the best job of gathering information and putting it in an easily readable fashion.

The book is divided among the different countries in the region. Knowing the attractions mainly of the Brazilian Amazon, I can say that about half of the businesses, phone numbers, addresses, etc. are outdated. It is to be expected, since this guide was published 4 yrs ago. The Brazilian section is good, with good advice especially on the surroundings of Manaus. It also provides good advice on what to bring and what to look for in the Amazon, which is useful and timeless.

To someone considering a trip to different places in the Amazon, if you want to get just one guide, I would recommend this one. If you are going to just one place, perhaps as a second guide book this would help, but I would not rely too heavily on the companies listed there, many of them no longer exist.

Good, fascinating, wide-sweeping 'book-to-take-with-you'
THE AMAZON Great rivers, vast impenetrable jungles, exotic lost cities and remote tribal people are the kind of images most of us conjure up when the Amazon is mentioned. But there is more to the region than this. I liked the way this book gives the adventurer, traveller or dreaming reader a resource that reveals some of stuff of myth, mystery and legend - while also providing the nitty-gritty detail of how to get there, what to do, what to see, moving around (from first class river boats, internal airlines, buses and taxis through to hitch-hiking) - and how to enjoy what could well be the experience of a lifetime.

The authors' challenge was to encapsulate an area three-quarters the size of the continental United States in a handy book. A task in which I think they succeed. The book in four sections. The first orientates us with an overview across the entire vast region. You will find: a brief history, getting there, what to take, descriptions of the people, sleeping and eating, climate, river regimes, planning an expedition and such like. For most travellers, the tropical forest will be an alien environment, so specific attention is given to health and personal safety - a topic that crops up in down-to-earth detail throughout the book. When snakes are mentioned for instance, you'll find advice on recognising those that are poisonous - and what to do if in the rare event you are bitten. And of infamous piranha we read with relief that their "attacks have injured people, but records show not one fatality."

Whereas the typical guide might describe the architecture and art, the next section enables the traveller, be it by river-boat and canoe, by trail-walking or by road, to grasp the detail of the forest's architecture, the 150ft high trees and the surrounding super-abundant natural art. You can marvel at nature's beauty - the orchids, flowers, ferns, floating meadows, and all manner of lianas and vines. And that's just the flavour of the flora. There is also a guide to the fauna - the animals of the canopy and forest floor, the birds like parrots, toucans, hummingbirds, plus a host of other exotic avian creatures. With the rivers so ubiquitous you are helped to identify reptiles, amphibians and the fabulous fishes. Most of the common insects are covered too.

Tucked away for the traveller to find are the forest's human inhabitants - so there is also information about these more ancient folk who have evolved a way of life, a culture that has adapted them to hard task of living in the dense jungle.

But those journeying through the region will need to go through at least one of the Amazon countries. So the third part of the book consists of a series of mini-guides. These give all the basic data any visitor will need. For each of the eight nation-states (and colony of French Guiana) there are the essential facts and figures - including how to access Internet - as well as introductions to the major towns and cities: where to stay (first class, middle and budget), eateries and the like. Outline maps of the countries and larger scale street maps of the bigger towns and cities will help readers find their way around.

Being monolingual I particularly appreciated the short English-Spanish and English-Portuguese 'survival' glossaries (with pronunciation keys) and the list of books for further reading.

Did the writers meet the challenge? I think so. Wisely the authors included extracts from other travellers and experts - so the drawings, maps and colored photographs are interspersed with boxes and sections that help to present a more balanced view of what travelling and staying in this vast region might actually be like - warts and all.

There is a downside. While prices are given in US dollars and many distances given in miles alongside their kilometre equivalent, most other numeric information is given in the more scientifically correct metric system. Also perhaps, I would have welcomed a few more light-hearted anecdotes about the area. As a seasoned traveller with over 45 countries under my boots, this is the kind of guide I would want study thoroughly before I went. I would also want to keep the book with me in my back-pack or suitcase to help me relish the ever changing surroundings. It's the kind of guide that will make your time in the region safer - and so much more pleasurable, exciting, rewarding and memorable. Buy it. It will be an investment.