Amazon Woman

February 1, 2020
A well-paced tale of outdoor adventure. "We are all, I suppose, confined to specific destinies and mine seems to be chasing rivers." So writes Gaechter, who decided to mark her 35th birthday--making her ancient, by competitive kayaking standards--by traveling the length of the Amazon River from source to outlet. Why do such a thing? Because it's there, of course, and no woman had been known to do it before, and there's no time like the present. Still, in the company of her longtime partner and a like-minded Brit, she tackled the project, emerging 148 days later after crossing South America from the Andes to the Atlantic. The physical challenges were extraordinary, although, the author notes, "keeping a cool head is the most important skill in kayaking, though by far the most difficult to master." There were plenty of opportunities to exercise that skill, for on top of the churning whitewater rapids and odd critters were the more dangerous denizens of the rainforest, including illegal loggers, Shining Path guerrillas whose "primary operations...now happen in remote jungle areas and involve the lucrative drug trade," and soldiers of fortune who could be quick with the trigger finger. Then there were the more quotidian culture clashes, for, as Gaechter patiently notes, "time is a point of contention between North Americans and Peruvians," making an important rendezvous all the more difficult to schedule. Was it worth dying in that jungle war zone in order to exercise her coveted freedom, she asks? The answer was no--but then again, as she writes, "I'd invested a lot of time and suffering already," reason enough to press on to the next canyon, rapid, anaconda, sulk, argument, and bad feeling ("I didn't want the person I loved acting like an asshole and lunatic, and that's what I often felt Don was doing") while vanquishing inner doubts. The author includes a glossary of kayak terms. Daring readers will be inspired to overcome similar challenges--and armchair travelers won't be disappointed.

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March 1, 2020
This is a powerful, adventure-filled memoir, beginning with the first page, where Gaechter shares a good-bye note she wrote to her parents, to be delivered if she didn't make it back alive from the Amazon. In 2013, Gaechter, one of the world's best kayakers, embarked on a quest to become the first woman to kayak the Amazon in a descent from source to sea. Along with her business partner and boyfriend, Don Beveridge, and a British adventurer, Dave Midge Midgley, the trio paddled three sections of the world-famous river, starting at the technically challenging Mantaro River. With a small support crew and armed with permission letters from government agencies and indigenous leaders allowing them to travel the 4,200-mile route, they battle class V white water and encounter numerous life-threatening situations over the 148-day journey, which included surviving an area known as the Red Zone, beset with drug traffickers and Shining Path terrorists. A fascinating memoir from a vagabond adventurer who shares her life lesson: don't let societal norms or pressure to conform hold you back from your dreams.Women in Focus: the 19th in 2020(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2020, American Library Association.)