A Walk in the Woods

Short of doing it yourself, the best way of escaping into nature is to read a book like A Walk in the Woods. In the company of his friend Stephen Katz, Bill Bryson set off to hike the Appalachian Trail, the longest continuous footpath in the world. Ahead lay almost 2,200 miles of remote mountain wilderness filled with bears, moose, bobcats, rattlesnakes, poisonous plants, disease-bearing ticks, the occasional chuckling murderer, and perhaps most alarming of all, people whose favorite pastime is discussing the relative merits of the external-frame backpack. Facing savage weather, merciless insects, unreliable maps, and a fickle companion whose profoundest wish was to go to a motel and watch The X-Files, Bryson gamely struggled through the wilderness to achieve a lifetime's ambition - not to die outdoors. A Walk in the Woods is now a major feature film starring Robert Redford, Emma Thompson, and Nick Offerman.