Expedition Costa Rica

This unusual story recounts an intrepid trek led by an eccentric Costa Rican with a life-long dream of meeting a remote tribe allegedly dwelling far up in the pristine mountains of untouched rainforest. This journal, by W. M. Raebeck, one of three females in a group of twenty-some adventurers, somehow survived a phenomenal amount of rain, river-crossings, mold, sweat, and tears. The book was written during the journey itself, an outing that didn't go at all as planned but served up a heap of glory along with endless woe.

An expedition, by definition, invites the unknown on a daily, sometimes hourly, basis—the undertaking itself something of a wild animal. Embarking on one means somehow finding a balance between fearlessness and fear—in a communal setting, without much food, under canopies of jungle. Add a few raindrops, too much cargo, mountains and more raindrops, and you've got the starting point of Expedition Costa Rica. If you enjoy tales about unusual people doing unusual things in the mud, this book is for you.