"The Mackenzie River Guide includes: more than 60 maps detailing the route from Hay River to Tuktoyuktuk; the history, services and festivals for 12 communities along the route; numerous hand drawn illustrations of plants and wildlife; colour photographs; quotes from locals, paddlers and historic figures; and Dene [Indians, Aboriginal or Native peoples] legends that relate to place names along the river."--author/publisher.

In 1789, Alexander Mackenzie traveled 1200 miles on the immense river in Canada that now bears his name, in search of the fabled Northwest Passage that had eluded mariners for hundreds of years. In 2016, the acclaimed memoirist Brian Castner retraced Mackenzie's route by canoe in a grueling journey -- and discovered the Passage he could not find. Disappointment River is a dual historical narrative and travel memoir that at once transports readers back to the heroic age of North American exploration and places them in a still rugged but increasingly fragile Arctic wilderness in the process of profound alteration by the dual forces of globalization and climate change. Fourteen years before Lewis and Clark, Mackenzie set off to cross the continent of North America with a team of voyageurs and Chipewyan guides, to find a trade route to the riches of the East. What he found was a river that he named "Disappointment." Mackenzie died thinking he had failed. He was wrong. In this book, Brian Castner not only retells the story of Mackenzie's epic voyages in vivid prose, he personally retraces his travels, battling exhaustion, exposure, mosquitoes, white water rapids and the threat of bears. He transports readers to a world rarely glimpsed in the media, of tar sands, thawing permafrost, remote indigenous villages and, at the end, a wide open Arctic Ocean that could become a far-northern Mississippi of barges and pipelines and oil money.

In the tradition of Michael Herr’s Dispatches and works by such masters of the memoir as Mary Karr and Tobias Wolff, a powerful account of war and homecoming. Brian Castner served three tours of duty in the Middle East, two of them as the commander of an Explosive Ordnance Disposal unit in Iraq. Days and nights he and his team—his brothers—would venture forth in heavily armed convoys from their Forward Operating Base to engage in the nerve-racking yet strangely exhilarating work of either disarming the deadly improvised explosive devices that had been discovered, or picking up the pieces when the alert came too late. They relied on an army of remote-controlled cameras and robots, but if that technology failed, a technician would have to don the eighty-pound Kevlar suit, take the Long Walk up to the bomb, and disarm it by hand. This lethal game of cat and mouse was, and continues to be, the real war within America’s wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. But The Long Walk is not just about battle itself. It is also an unflinching portrayal of the toll war exacts on the men and women who are fighting it. When Castner returned home to his wife and family, he began a struggle with a no less insidious foe, an unshakable feeling of fear and confusion and survivor’s guilt that he terms The Crazy. His thrilling, heartbreaking, stunningly honest book immerses the reader in two harrowing and simultaneous realities: the terror and excitement and camaraderie of combat, and the lonely battle against the enemy within—the haunting memories that will not fade, the survival instincts that will not switch off. After enduring what he has endured, can there ever again be such a thing as “normal”? The Long Walk will hook you from the very first sentence, and it will stay with you long after its final gripping page has been turned.

Re-live the experiences of the people who traveled to the distant and untouched Mackenzie Mountains of Canada’s Northwest Territories. This raw, beautiful land was opened to outfitting in 1965, when intrepid entrepreneurs carried out exploratory hunts by horse and backpack to determine whether the Mackenzies were worth an outfitting investment. Five men initially set out to build their businesses in this remote country, making a living through a lot of hard work and a little bit of luck. Guides, cooks and wranglers contributed to their success in the hunt for Dall sheep, grizzly bears, mountain caribou, mountain goats and moose. Their stories are filled with tales of animal encounters, tragedy and humour. Today, eight outfitters operate in the Mackenzie Mountains as the area remains as remote and beautiful as when the original five outfitters trekked into the area in the 1960’s. I hope you enjoy reading Voices From the Mackenzies as much as I enjoyed writing about the folks who made their living in this beautiful country.

National bestseller A thrilling odyssey through an unforgiving landscape, from "Canada's greatest living explorer." In the spring of 2017, Adam Shoalts, bestselling author and adventurer, set off on an unprecedented solo journey across North America's greatest wilderness. A place where, in our increasingly interconnected, digital world, it's still possible to wander for months without crossing a single road, or even see another human being. Between his starting point in Eagle Plains, Yukon Territory, to his destination in Baker Lake, Nunavut, lies a maze of obstacles: shifting ice floes, swollen rivers, fog-bound lakes, and gale-force storms. And Shoalts must time his departure by the breakup of the spring ice, then sprint across nearly 4,000 kilometers of rugged, wild terrain to arrive before winter closes in. He travels alone up raging rivers that only the most expert white-water canoeists dare travel even downstream. He must portage across fields of jagged rocks that stretch to the horizon, and navigate labyrinths of swamps, tormented by clouds of mosquitoes every step of the way. And the race against the calendar means that he cannot afford the luxuries of rest, or of making mistakes. Shoalts must trek tirelessly, well into the endless Arctic summer nights, at times not even pausing to eat. But his reward is the adventure of a lifetime. Heart-stopping, wonder-filled, and attentive to the majesty of the natural world, Beyond the Trees captures the ache for adventure that afflicts us all.

Provides sufficient detail to model 10 boats to scale or build them full size. Instruction and step-by-step photos for building a traditional boat to scale. With measured drawings for 10 traditional boats, including the Light McKenzie River Boat and the Rogue River Driver.

A completely revised and updated edition of our comprehensive guidebook to the South Nahanni and Flat rivers, Nahanni River Guideis an invaluable resource for anyone planning a trip into this unique wilderness area of the Northwest Territories. As well as providing a careful description of the river, including rapids ratings and advice on handling the more challenging whitewater sections, the author's travel tips tell you all the information you'll need to make your trip a success.