A Lady's Life in the Rocky Mountains
by Isabella L. Bird
Overview
From the Publisher
In 1872, Isabella Bird, daughter of a clergyman, set off alone to the Antipodes 'in search of health' and found she had embarked on a life of adventurous travel. In 1873, wearing Hawaiian riding dress, she rode her horse through the American Wild West, a terrain only newly opened to pioneer settlement. The letters that make up this volume were first published in 1879. They tell of magnificent, unspoiled landscapes and abundant wildlife, of encounters with rattlesnakes, wolves, pumas and grizzly bears, and her reactions to the volatile passions of the miners and pioneer settlers. A classic account of a truly astounding journey.
My thoughts
Thank you, thank you, thank you, Lynda Linder, for recommending this book! What a find! I love it! And the bonus is that it's public domain now, so it's FREE on Kindle!
I love the travel genre, so I'm always up for a recommendation of a good travel book. I'm hooked on Isabella Bird after reading her journals from the Rocky Mountains witten in the late 1800s. The writing is phenomenal! It's so descriptive you can smell the air as you read, or feel the chill, or sense comfort or discomfort as we share the journey with her. She has a lot more adventure than I'll ever desire - what a brave woman to set out alone in that time period - but we are kindred spirits in that we marvel at scenic beauty and feel the need to worship in the grandeur of nature. We appreciate the mountain flowers, the rugged mountains, the flow of river stream, and the characters we meet along the way as we travel.
An excellent book (Did I mention that it's FREE for Kindle?!) and I can't wait to download more of Isabella Bird's books!
Favorite Passage
But, above all, it was exciting to lie there, with no better shelter than a bower of pines, on a mountain 11,000 feet high, in the very heart of the Rocky Range, under twelve degrees of frost, hearing sounds of wolves, with shivering stars looking through the fragrant canopy, with arrowy pines for bed-posts, and for a night lamp the red flames of a camp-fire.
