Arctic Daughter
A Wilderness Journey
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- $23.99
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- $23.99
Publisher Description
Setting off in an overloaded canoe, they journeyed down the Yukon River and walked upstream into the remote Brooks Range to build a cabin and live off the land. She was twenty-two, daughter of a famous woman adventurer. He was her childhood sweetheart. Four years later, they emerged from the Alaskan wilds. Now in her sixties, Jean Aspen updates her spellbinding tale of adventure in a harsh and beautiful land for a new generation. ARCTIC DAUGHTER is at once an extraordinary journey of self-discovery and a lyrical odyssey. A READER'S DIGEST book selection, this remarkable tale of survival and courage measures the value of dreams against the unforgiving realities of the natural world. First published in 1988 by Bergamot Books, Minneapolis, MN.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
This stark, philosophical work chronicles Aspen, an artist and daughter of the author-adventurer Connie Helmericks, who, 16 years ago at the age of 22, chose to sojourn into the wilderness of Alaska, above the Arctic Circle, and live off the land. Aspen was accompanied by her first husband-to-be Phil; her harsh, relentlessly honest journal depicts two stoics who ate salted and dried horse meat, berries, evenunder miserable circumstancesraw, rubbery moose that contained ``the wriggly pearl of a maggot.'' The couple encountered no other humans for almost a year, and in that time the author sought the `` `essence' of experience . . . that elusive something that makes the world sparkle.'' Aspen believed that civilization snatches away more than it gives in return: ``I'm not certain that all our toys are worth what we pay for them.'' Rather, she endured the brutal weather and exalted when the sun returned after a 60-day absence: ``Life isn't safe, no matter how carefully you plan. . . . You may as well enjoy the ride.'' Aspen's journey isn't pretty reading, but her voice is memorable and her endurance marvelous.
