Re: [Paddlewise] Paul Theroux

From: Allison Corning <acorning_at_hotmail.com>
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 1999 06:07:29 PDT
Alex wrote

"The paddling bit in Fiji, Vanua Levu I found interesting as he had his
directions entirely wrong and after I'd sorted that out, it appears he got
to the same location that we stopped at one night and we had the villagers
so friendly, wanting us to come to their village, no come to our village
etc. where as he said they weren't friendly. He did not do himself a
service by his attitude. Fortunately didn't do a disservice to all kayakers.
I was told that he had time to paddle one bit of Australia or write about
it, not both, wrote as if he'd paddled it. I would not take it as a good
"paddling guide" from what I've read and heard."


Well, I'll admit that PT is a bit prickly at times, but if everyone was 
supposed to have the same experiences at the exact same places, there would 
be no reason to travel anywhere, since we could all sit home and read about 
it.  As far as Australia, all writing is an elaboration of the truth- Since 
I wouldn't use this book as a guide for a trip without consulting primary 
sources(as you did), I'm willing to suspend my disbelief long enough to 
enjoy a good story about a land I've never seen. I'm glad you had an 
interesting trip! Have you written it out anywhere?


-Allison



***************************************************************************
PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List
Submissions:     paddlewise_at_lists.intelenet.net
Subscriptions:   paddlewise-request_at_lists.intelenet.net
Website:         http://www.paddlewise.net/
***************************************************************************
Received on Fri Sep 17 1999 - 06:09:54 PDT

This archive was generated by hypermail 2.4.0 : Thu Aug 21 2025 - 16:30:13 PDT