River : One Man's Journey Down the Colorado, Source to Sea

Colin Fletcher, the author of the Grand Canyon classic The Man Who Walked Through Time, adds to his life list of desert voyages with a trip down the 1,700-mile-long Colorado River. From its sources in the Wind River Mountains of Wyoming to its union with the Gulf of California, Fletcher traces the Colorado in an entertaining and often quite funny travelogue. More seriously, he ponders his own life's passage, musing on lost loves, the experience of war, the onset of old age, and impending mortality. Despite the title, other travelers have made this journey--devotees of the Colorado will know the writings of John Wesley Powell and the Kolb brothers, among others. That notwithstanding, Fletcher makes keen observations of the area's geology and wildlife, and of human behavior.