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This book was converted from its physical edition to the digital format by a community of volunteers. You may find it for free on the web. Purchase of the Kindle edition includes wireless delivery.Download Description
You will remember that I wrote from Kilauea regarding the terror which the Goddess of the Crater inspired, and her high-priest was necessarily a very awful personage. The particular high-priest of whom Mr. Coan told me was six feet five inches in height, and his sister, who was co-ordinate with him in authority, had a scarcely inferior altitude. His chief business was to keep Pélé appeased. He lived on the shore, but often went up to Kilauea with sacrifices. If a human victim were needed, he had only to point to a native, and the unfortunate wretch was at once strangled. ... Read more

Book Description
This book was converted from its physical edition to the digital format by a community of volunteers. You may find it for free on the web. Purchase of the Kindle edition includes wireless delivery. ... Read more

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Customer Reviews (1)

Left Out in the Cold in Tibet
I was somewhat disappointed in this book. Certainly, the noble Ms. Bird had made this remarkable journey (and many others) in a time (the late 1800s) when 'women didn't do such things'. For that I applaud her spirit and determination.
While interesting, in my opinion, most of the book comes across as fairly uninspired. She seems unable to share the sense of wonder one must feel when in the presence of such dramatic physical geography. Her description of the local citizenry is, to my mind, also fairly unimaginative. While her narrative is certainly straight forward and no doubt accurate, it seems she never really 'gets into it'.
There are several moments in the story when we are given an insight into Ms. Bird's character and we see her as an enormously resilient and self-reliant person. There are also interesting glimpses of her Victorian roots as portrayed in her comments regarding local Tibetan customs and habits.
All in all, I would recommend this book but I would caution the reader not to expect 'Lost Horizons'.
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A lone woman traveler in China
Intrepid is the adjective that best applies to Isabella Bird.She was one of the best known travel writers of the Victorian era.She suffered from an odd probably psychosomatic disease that made her an invalid at home in Scotland -- but plant her down in China, Colorado, or Japan and give her a difficult and dangerous road to travel and she is as hardy as a bristlecone pine.

This book is about a journey Ms. Bird made about 1897 from the mouth of the Yangtze River to the Sichuan basin and the borders of Tibet.She did most of it as a solo female, accompanied only by Chinese bearers and servants, and traveling by mule, boat, foot, sedan chair, and about every other means of transport.She was more than 60 years old at the time and suffered from rheumatism.

Ms. Bird is a demon for detail and she comments on a vast range of topics during the course of her travels -- and she seems to know what she is talking about, unlike many travel writers whose accounts are embroidered and exaggerated.With Bird you have confidence that she's telling you the truth, quaint though some of her views may be.

The most interesting part of the book, in my opinion, are Ms. Bird's difficulties with Chinese officials and the public.She was beaned in the head with a rock on one occasion, which caused a "brain disturbance" that lasted a year; Chinese frequently refused to sell her food or give her shelter and officials tried to intimidate and discourage her at every opportunity.But Isabella Bird was undaunted, crossing 11,000 feet passes, weathering snowstorms, hunger, and hardship and recording her experiences in amazing detail.The book is nearly 600 pages long.

Isabella Bird's travel books are travel classics. Read this or any of her books to get a tale of exotic adventures in foreign lands -- and to wonder why this respectable female was so addicted to tramping around the world.

Smallchief ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

wonderful glimpse into hawaiian culture as it was long ago
If you are visiting Hawaii and you are interested in learning more than a guide book can tell you, this book is a must.It is an entertaining and adventurous tale of a daring woman's visit in 1873.It is a long book, butit will give you a much deeper experience of a fascinating land and itspeople. ... Read more

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Customer Reviews (2)

High adventure
This is one of the best known and most highly respected travel accounts of a foreigner to the western region of the United States during the 19th century. Isabella Bird, a spinster world traveler, upon returning to her native England from an excursion to Hawaii, decided to stop in America and make a three-month tour of the Rocky Mountain region of Colorado. In a series of letters written to her sister in England, Ms. Bird told in fascinating detail her experiences during this "tour."

Going by train from San Francisco to Cheyenne (except for a brief hiatus near Truckee Pass, which she traversed by horseback), she was in Fort Collins, Colorado, by September 10, 1873. Her travels took her to Denver, Colorado Springs, South Park, Boulder, and Estes Park, where she climbed Longs Peak. Her observations, whether about the people she encounters or the natural wonders all about her, are acute, objective, and highly personal. She will complain about the annoying insects in one letter and then calmly relate taking a tumble off her horse when surprised by a bear in another. She is astounded by the natural beauty of the region and never seems to get enough of it; she also believes, as the saying then went, that "there is no God west of the Missouri," and that the "almighty dollar is the true divinity" (these observations made while in Denver). She recognizes the (especially) English prejudice against all things American, and refuses to go along with it. What makes Ms. Bird's book so enduring is the direct though lighthearted tone she maintains: she is an astute observer but never gives the impression she's "studying" the people or places she sees. The book can be read often and will remain entertaining each time. It's a classic - in a good sense of that word. Highly recommended.

Life in 1873
In 1873 a middle-aged Lady Bird, acklaimed horsewoman,spent the fall through winter travelling in the Rocky Mountains.As a 10 year resident of Colorado Springs and growing up riding, I was intrigued by her travels.What most people find amazing about this book are her very detailed and beautiful descriptions of what she saw.I have to agree, I did find myself wallowing within what she saw.Especially, since I have seen many of the places (in modern day) that she went.What I, myself, found truly interesting was how she describes in her rather off-hand, like it's mundane, way about the daily hardships she and the settlers had to endure.This isn't the old Grandpa had to walk 10 miles, up hill, in 10 feet of snow, in 60 below weather, both ways to school.It's a true representation of what "Grandpa" had to endure. It breeds a new-[t][/t]found respect for our ancestors and makes one wonder, "Could I endure it?". ... Read more

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It is a mistake to arrive at a yadoya after dark. Even if the best rooms are not full it takes fully an hour to get my food and the room ready, and meanwhile I cannot employ my time usefully because of the mosquitoes. There was heavy rain all night, accompanied by the first wind that I have heard since landing; and the fitful creaking of the pines and the drumming from the shrine made me glad to get up at sunrise, or rather at daylight, for there has not been a sunrise since I came, or a sunset either.Download Description
It is a mistake to arrive at a yadoya after dark. Even if the best rooms are not full it takes fully an hour to get my food and the room ready, and meanwhile I cannot employ my time usefully because of the mosquitoes. There was heavy rain all night, accompanied by the first wind that I have heard since landing; and the fitful creaking of the pines and the drumming from the shrine made me glad to get up at sunrise, or rather at daylight, for there has not been a sunrise since I came, or a sunset either. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (3)

unexpected japan
Bird provides a view of Japan that was unknown to outsiders in that day, and is little known to us today.The scenes she descibes of the interior of Japan would scarecly entice today's traveler; whichmakes her adventures all the more intriguing. Her extensive knowledge of history and botany enhances the drama; however,had sheincuded a glossary of terms, as well as the common names of flora it would have sped my reading as I had to repeatedly refer to dictionaries and botanic references.Her ethnocentrism is revealed as she describes the natives of the area; a pracctice that would be frowned upon today. Never-the-less I look forward to reading more of her works.

Isabella Bird, Woman of Great Courage
This is one of the great travel books of all time.First of all it is an adventure. This English woman decided, for some strange reason of health, in 1878 to go to Japan and travel from Tokyo to the island of Hokkaido, roughly 500 miles as the crow flys but much longer by her route. She went "off the beaten track" where Westerners, men or women had never been before. Japan had been opened up to the West only 10 years before her journey.Word of her coming to a village (on horseback) caused such excitement that people that wanted a better view caused the roof of a building to collapse.Changing into night clothes was an ordeal because people would poke holes in the screens to watch her every move.Then there was the bugs and the rain storms and the rivers, etc., etc. It was well written and a joy to read.

Fascinating 19th Century Woman
This book is actually a series of letters written in the 1870's by Isabella Bird, an intrepid Scotswoman,to her sister. Japan had "opened" to the west only some 10 years earlier and she was determined to visit the "untoured" areas of inland Japan, off the beaten track. I wondered to myself how many hordes of Western tourists had there already been to Japan at that time? What makes this book so interesting is twofold. First of all she describes peasant and village life in areas which were quite poor and did not conform to the picture of Japanese life in the cities of Tokyo or Kyoto at that time or now. As was true for Europe at the same period, there were huge differences in the standards of living between the different classes and between town and village. Her descriptions of the Ainu were especially vivid and interesting. The other aspect is Isabella Bird herself. She traveled by pack horse, cow, rickshaw and on foot via mountain tracks and fording countless rivers. She slept in flea infested Ryokan and endured being stared at endlessly. For weeks at a time she could speak only to her servant/interpreter since she did not know Japanese. Recommended for those with an interest in Japan or good travel writing. ... Read more

Book Description
A Victorian lady and a bear-wrestling mountain man share adventure in this historically accurate play set in Estes Park, Colorado, in 1873.Isabella Bird became world-renowned for her adventures, and her friendship with Rocky Mountain Jim Nugent has become legend.This play also shows the conniving machinations and fierce struggle to control the land near Rocky Mountain National Park. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

A great play that makes the viewer think...
In "Thunder is the Mountain's" Voice," Kiesa Kay creates a bright, electric storm of love and triumph interwoven underneath a wickedly vile plot and cruel antagonists.With "Thunder," which tells thetale of the fair English lady Isabella Bird encountering the ruggedmountainman Rocky Mountain Jim Nugent on her quest to conquer and climb thegreatest midwestern peak of all: Long's Peak, Kay makes each charactergleam with fluidly written language and a very shocking climax. ***** ... Read more

Book Description

This unique photographic record of turn-of -the-century China is filled with typical scenes of Chinese life. Beautiful pictures of shrines, homes, city gates, rivers, and tradesmen appear in the book, allowing readers to voyage into China's past. Explanatory notes accompany each photograph.

Book Description
Award-winning biography of 19th adventure Isabella Bird who visited Colorado, Hawaii and Australia, and gallivanted around Japan, China, Korea, Russia and Tibet writing best-selling books about her travels. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Great book - so much to admire in this woman!
I loved this book. What a character! Not only didshe travel the world, but she did it with her own money and under her own leadership. Admittedly, she hired lots of support (whole entourages in some cases) butnevertheless, the journies were hers andhers alone. I've done alot oftraveling as a single woman, and even these days it takes some courageandself-reliance. I have much admiration for Isabella Bird, who went to allthese far-flung places before there were all the modern conveniences andattitudes. Phenomenal woman! ... Read more

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This critical study of three intrepid travelers to Southeast Asia -- Bird (1831-1904), Dauthendey (1867-1918), Wu (1904-1992) — combines detailed analysis of travel literature with carefully researched historical background and argues that any travel narrative is inevitably a product of the traveler's own cultural and social background. Thus travel narrative is never an objective account -- the reader must take into consideration the traveler's own history. By juxtaposing the views of a Chinese with those of two Western travelers, this book shows that prejudice and racism can exist in both the West and the East.

In choosing a Victorian traveler, a German poet, and a Chinese writer, Ng's study encompasses a geographical area that includes Britain, Germany, China, as well as Southeast Asia and an historical span from the Victorian era to the twentieth century. Three Exotic Views of Southeast Asia is theoretically informed by postcolonial and poststructural criticism. But it also details particular historical contexts, thus evoking the glamour and magic of traveling in a bygone era.

Apart from an examination of a broad range of literature by, among many others, Henry Mayhew, Somerset Maugham, Thomas Mann, and Ba Jin, this groundbreaking study also discusses architecture, fine arts, philanthropic culture, and the rise of mass tourism. Original translations from the German and the Chinese are by the author. ... Read more

Book Description
Until the middle-aged, unmarried Isabella Bird (1831-1904) left her native Scotland for an independent life of travel, she was debilitated by illness, suffering from "neuralgia, pain in my bones, pricking like pins and needles in my limbs, excruciating nervousness, exhaustion, inflamed eyes, sore throat, swelling of the glands behind each ear, stupidity." Bird was so weak that she required a steel support to hold her head up and spent most of her time confined to bed. Desperate to find a cure, her doctors finally packed her off to the Pacific and Switzerland. Once there, the forty-year-old invalid miraculously recovered, and became determined to seek any adventure that allowed her to see the singular beauty of nature.

In Hawaii, she was the first woman to climb the world's highest volcano; in Perak, she rode elephants through the jungles; in Colorado, she scaled 14,000 foot mountains, spent six months traveling mostly alone on horseback, and fell in love with a one-eyed desperado named Rocky Mountain Jim. But whenever she came home to Scotland, her symptoms returned, making another trip essential. Bird's remarkable journeys took her to the remotest parts of the world and brought her considerable fame. She became the first female Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society, advised Prime Minister William Gladstone on the issue of Armenian Christians, and was presented to Queen Victoria in 1893. Her numerous travel writings, including 'The Hawaiian Archipelago,' 'A Lady's Life in the Rocky Mountains,' 'Unbeaten Tracks in Japan,' and 'The Golden Chersonese,' remain popular today.

In this fascinating collection of Bird's previously unpublished letters to her homebound younger sister Henrietta, one experiences her journeys firsthand and gains insight into the ambiguous private life of a woman who often invented her public face. Containing correspondence from her first two grand tours to Australia, Hawaii, and Colorado in 1872-1873, and to Japan, China, Malaya, and the Holy Land in 1878-1879, 'Letters to Henrietta' provides a fresh view of the legendary Victorian traveler. ... Read more

Book Description
The valiant and lyrically descriptive letters written in 1873 by Isabella Bird, a courageous and spirited Englishwoman, tells her sister in vivid detail of her adventures on horseback over 800 miles of American wilderness.Five 90-minute cassettes. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (12)

very good review
This book arrived in top condition and in time. In a college book store this book cost a lot more, so I am very pleased to be able to buy it from this seller.

descriptive
I thoroughly enjoyed this book and the descriptive way the author wrote.I have been through Colorado and have seen the beauty she described.Also enjoyed the story because there wasn't a lot of violence and if there was any sex, it was only in our imagination which is the greatest kind.I was amazed at how the lady rode for miles in rugged wilderness without seeming to get lost.The fact that she could subsist on meager food was also interesting.

Well-written account of an incredible Rocky Mountain experience!
I bought this book while visiting Estes Park, CO...hungry for books about life in the West that may not be so readily available here in NJ.I found it to be one of the most enjoyable books I have ever read!Isabella's descriptions of the Rocky Mountains and the climate through which she travelled are vivid and gripping.But more than that, she gives a detailed and honest account of what life was like for settlers on the frontier.How she managed to ride thru the mountains where the only "trails" were tracks of wagons or animals, when often those were covered with the seemingly constant snow, boggles the mind.Her love for Colorado sings out in every word she writes.I too was deeply touched by its beauty, and hope to return again, this time with an enriched appreciation due to this wonderful recounting of Isabella Bird's journey.

Don't overlook this
For many years I saw this book in National Park bookstores and passed it by thinking it would be an example of the overwritten, rather tedious journals of other Victorian travelers.When I finally found it at a used bookstore and rather reluctantly bought it, I was surprised to find out how exciting and relevant her story was.

Because I live in Colorado, I recoginize and travel through many of the places she describes.Just this weekend as we traveled along Highway 67, my husband and I remarked on the likelihood, that this was the same route she'd taken out of Colorado Springs.

Her accounts lend life to the grey, weatherbeaten cabins, abandoned roads and rusting rails that we see.Even though many parts of Europe and the US were relatively modern at the time of her adventures, it is surprising to read just how primitive and precarious was the life of many Colorado settlers.

Even if you aren't from Colorado, read this book to become aquainted with a Victorian woman who found a way to live life fully.Read it to learn about life in the west.Read it just because it's a good read.

Free Bird
Did you ever read any of the BEANY MALONE novels by Lenora Mattingly Weber?In them I first read about Isabella Bird and her remarkable life in the American West.Beany's older brother, Johnny Malone, is a teenager when the series begins, a young Denver boy with a remarkable passion for unearthing the memoirs and daguerrotypes of Colorado pioneers and taking notes on the old-timers who settled the state.Their colorful lives make his ordinary life seem rather pastel, so he often sinks into a nostalgia of the past, while his family members tease him about the dreamy look in his eyes.He helps a veteran journalist, Emerson Worth, complete his magnum opus, OUR CITY HAS DEEP ROOTS.And among the pioneers Johnny obsessed about was none other than Isabella Bird, so when I found this book on a recent trip to Boulder, I added it to my rucksack.

If you are reading on horseback, as Isabella Bird did, this is perhaps the ideal book to carry with you.She was a woman used to the English-style horse with its Ascot breeding and high carriage.What she found in Colorado were, naturally, the horses of the West, more perfectly adapted to the mile-high atmospheres, but slung somewhat lower than anything she's been used to and slightly swaybacked.Bird adapted quickly, and the fun of her autobiography is to see her taking in her stride a series of calamities and hardships that would have Job complaining bitterly!No matter if it's an insect infestation or tumbling right through a sheet of ice into zero degree river chills, for Isabella Bird it's all part of a day's fun.Travel writing in the 19th century was, of course, the leading genre of prose.From no other source were English-speaking readers able to find out more about other people's lives, and the curiosity was immense.

You'll like Isabella, and her crazy love affair with Colorado.She remains very much a lady, but will challenge your preconceived notions of what a lady is and isn't.Most of all you will thrill to follow the course of her journeys up and down the mountains through which, now, there are some better trails but still the same amazing sunrises which she describes with the thrill of one for whom every day's an adventure. ... Read more

Book Description
Isabella Bird, daughter of an Anglican clergyman, defies her family and in the 1870s leaves home at a young age to travel the world alone. Of her adventures, none is more daunting than her determination to be the first woman to climb Long's Peak, the highest point in the Colorado Rockies. Although she is accustomed to hardships, Miss Bird faces undreamed-of obstacles in her Colorado adventure and the one man who can help her gain the summit of the mountain is an outlaw named Rocky Mountain Jim Nugent. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Isabelle Bird--a likable character.
Earl Murray of course did a good job in writing an excellent book, again. Since Isabelle Bird, the main character in this book, did a lot of travelling all over, I think a good series on many of her travels would bea great idea. If you're interested in reading about women in the west, thisbook is one to read. I have not yet been disappointed in any of Murray'sbooks. ... Read more