Walking In Australia

This title is part of Lonely Planet's comprehensive hiking series for lovers of the great outdoors and offers a range of hikes, from easy to daytime strolls to long challenging treks, plus reliable, detailed maps and essential travel information.

David Robbins published his first short story at 19 and his first book 25 years later. In 1986, for The 29thParallel, he was awarded South Africa’s prestigious CNA Literary Award, after having been shortlisted with Christopher Hope and J M Coetzee. Since then he has published extensively on southern African themes, becoming established as a writer of extraordinary perception in the literary travel and short fiction genres. In 1995 he published the first of two travel books covering 22 countries on the African continent, which enjoyed international success; and in 2010 he received a Lifetime Achievement Literary Award from the South African Ministry of Arts and Culture. A year before receiving this acknowledgement of his contribution to local literature, he had already embarked on the major project currently under discussion. Several visits to Australia had ignited his interest in the ‘Out-of-Africa’ hypothesis of modern humanity’s peopling of the world. Walking to Australia has been the result of extensive travel in the countries occupying the northern shores of the Indian Ocean, and of seven years of intermittent researching and writing. The book describes a 21st century journey following the direction taken by anatomically modern humans who left the African nursery around 80000 years ago and reached Australia 20000 years later. Along the way, they laid the genetic foundations for humanity’s oldest civilizations – and ultimately inhabited every corner of the globe. The result of these travels is not a scientific treatise. Although the science is not ignored, the centre lies elsewhere. The author undertakes this west-to-east endeavor in the imagined company of his autistic grandson, who serves both as confidant and as a human archetype. This allows the book to verge upon a unique blend of factual travel writing and an almost magical internalised interpretation. What the two travellers find together is a tangle of new experiences and responses, from which the linkages between primeval past and complex present gradually emerge. Here is a work of literary travel writing that describes an enchanted journey through some of the ancient places of the world and into the currently deeply troubled heart of the human adventure. The evidence encountered on the journey suggests that a fundamental universality of humanity’s place in the cosmos lies beneath all regional differences and is characterised as much by humility and co-operation as it is by the imperative to survive and/or the will to power. The book does not set out to prove a point, however, but to celebrate the complexity of human responses. It is more a creative work than it is a dissertation with an unambiguous conclusion. Nevertheless, the bibliography gives an indication of some of the sources used, which includes the work of historians, archaeologists, political scientists, biographers and psychologists, as well as authors writing on the various religions of the world.

Includes 72 detailed walks, from multi-day adventures to easy day walks close to major cities. Contour maps, equipment advice, transport options.

Describes the 660 km walking track from Walhalla near Melbourne to the outskirts of Canberra. An all colour book, it includes 51 colour topographic maps, gradient profiles and many sidetrips and alternative tracks.

The first full length history of bush walking in Australia. Offers some marvellous pen portraits of the extraordinary characters that pioneered bushwalking in this country.

A great walk can be an exhilarating experience that will stay with you forever. Perhaps you're stirred by endless mountain views or soothed by stepping into a living green cathedral. Maybe the challenge drives you harder and farther than you thought possible. Sometimes you'll find yourself in the presence of a rare creature and feel a jolt of connection. There's always magic to be found when walking but the very best walks will do all of these things. Fortunately, Australia is full of extraordinary walks - here's our collection of the best to be found in every corner of this country.

The inspiring story of one man's survival after a life-changing accident, and how to find possibility in life's darkest moments. In a split second, Mark Berridge's life came crashing down. His bicycle understeered through a corner, the impact wrenching him over the handlebars and catapulting him headfirst into a stormwater drain. A large piece of dislodged vertebrae compressed his spinal cord, causing devastating nerve damage. The accident fractured Mark's body and his identity. Fortunately, his helmet – though deeply crushed – protected his ability to think and retain valuable memories, allowing him to pursue every possible avenue in his physical recovery and beyond. Mark spent more than six weeks in hospital and nine months in intensive rehabilitation. His sustained effort to regain mobility became an integral part of his new identity. A Fraction Stronger is Mark's story, focused on the insight and inspiration that will guide you through life's impossible moments. Mark shares how small actions, combined with determination to seek out possibility in the darkness, can light your way forwards.