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When Henry Hudson explored the Delaware River in 1609, he dubbed it “one of the finest, best, and pleasantest rivers in the world.” Today, those same qualities make the Delaware one of the most popular rivers for recreational use in the United States. Although in places a near-wilderness, the Delaware is easily accessible to millions of residents. On any summer day there may be thousands of people rushing down its exciting rapids or lazing through its serene eddies.

A Paddler’s Guide to the Delaware River is an indispensable resource for anyone who wants to experience the Delaware River in a kayak, canoe, raft, or tube—or, for that matter, an automobile or an armchair. Reading the book is like travelling down the river with an experienced guide. It charts the non-tidal Delaware 200 miles from Hancock, New York, to Trenton, New Jersey, describing access points, rapids, natural features, villages, historical sites, campgrounds, outfitters, and restaurants. The Delaware comes alive as the author introduces some of the people, places, events, and  controversies that have marked the river from earliest times to the present day.
Completely revised, the third edition offers:

• An overview of the river including watershed, history, place names, paddlecraft, safety, and fishing.
• The River Guide: ten sections that can each be paddled in one day (about 20 miles), with a mile-by-mile account of rapids, access, natural features, historic sites, and other features.
• All new maps, with names for virtually every rapid, eddy, and other river feature, plus detailed diagrams for routes through even the most severe rapids.
• Features in the River Guide highlight the people, events, natural history, and communities that define the river experience, such as Tom Quick, the infamous “avenger of the Delaware”; the mysterious migration of eels, the battle over Tocks Island Dam; and many others.
• Appendices of Important Contacts, Outfitters and Campgrounds, River Trip Checklists, and more.

Whether you are a novice out for an afternoon float, a seasoned adventurer on an overnight expedition, or a resident fascinated by the lore of the Delaware Valley, this book is an invaluable guide.

In 1955 Arthur Moffatt led an expedition consisting of young college students and recent graduates to the Inuit lands of Nunavut, Canada, to follow the path of the 1893 Tyrrell expedition and to film and photograph the group’s progress. The expedition, a 900-mile epic journey across the Barren Lands of Arctic Canada, has stirred controversy and criticism for over fifty years. The trip has been variously described as “the pioneering venture in modern recreational canoe travel” and as “an excellent example of how not to conduct a canoe trip.” Delays took their toll on the adventurers, exhausted by the seemingly endless paddling through unknown rivers and lakes, the trek across the windswept tundra, and torment by voracious insects. Threatened with diminishing food reserves and increasingly harsh weather, the members of the expedition were forced to travel with greater speed and less caution, and ultimately a fatal mistake was made. Two of the canoes capsized, dumping four men into the frigid waters. Moffatt, the leader, died of exposure. It took the survivors ten days of arduous travel with minimum food and equipment to reach the safety of the Hudson’s Bay Company post. Barren Grounds features passages from the journals of two young Moffatt party members and excerpts about the 1893 expedition of Joseph Burr Tyrrell, along with entries from the journal of Art Moffatt himself. Part cautionary tale, part nail-biting adventure, the book will appeal to outdoorsmen and armchair adventurers alike.

Canoe Country Camping is a complete, entertaining, and up-to-date guide that gives you the information you need for a safe and enjoyable canoe trip.

First-time campers will find answers to all their questions about where to go, how to pack, and what to do. Seasoned campers will find helpful tips to streamline their planning and make their next trip better than ever.

Prepare for all the challenges of the wilderness from the obvious to the unexpected. Michael Furtman, experienced Boundary Waters and Quetico canoeist, helps you: plan your adventure, pick your gear, pack for the portage, paddle efficiently, and prepare a comfortable camp.

Canoe Country Camping is chock full of handy checklists, helpful charts, and detailed drawings. Use it before you go. Take it along in your pack for quick reference. Then get out there with confidence, relax and enjoy your trip.

Warblers, wolves, and whirligig beetles—the creatures of the canoe countrywilderness come alive in Canoe Country Wildlife. In this read-aloud treasure, “Sparky” Stensaas, naturalist and storyteller, intrigues you with his tales of encounters with the forest inhabitants—from tiny toads to majestic moose.

Canoe Country Wildlife, a friendly field guide, introduces you to the wildlife you are most likely to see as you travel in the North Woods. It describes these creatures and their habits accurately so you’ll know where and when to look for them. Detailed line drawings illustrate each animal clearly so you’ll recognize what you’re seeing.

The book is filled with fascinating little-known facts: Did you know that wood frogs can freeze solid, only to live again? That loons can fly a hundred miles an hour? That chipmunks can carry seventy sunflower seeds in their cheeks?

Canoe Country Wildlife includes handy checklists to help you keep track of the critters you encounter, a calendar for you to record the natural events you witness, and activities—one for each animal—that will help both adults and children learn by discovery.

Carry Canoe Country Wildlife in your pack. Your trip will be more enjoyable and your memories will last forever. It’s a great gift for anyone who loves the outdoors.

The Driftless Area is the land the glaciers missed, an ancient landscape of bluffs, ridgetops, and steep valleys that long ago was a seabed. Covering much of southwestern Wisconsin, its contours were deeply carved from bedrock, not by ice but by many rivers.
            Crossing the Driftless is both a traveler’s tale and an exploration of this dramatic environment, following the streams of geologic and human history. Lynne Diebel and her husband, Bob, crossed the Driftless Area by canoe, journeying 359 river miles (and six Mississippi River locks and five portages) from Faribault, Minnesota, where her family has a summer home on Cedar Lake, to their Wisconsin home in Stoughton, one block from the Yahara River. Traveling by river and portage, they paddled downstream on the Cannon and Mississippi rivers and upstream on the Wisconsin River, in the tradition of voyageurs. Lynne tells the story of their trip, but also the stories of the rivers they canoed and the many tributaries whose confluences they passed.

Finalist, Travel, Foreword Reviews IndieFab Book of the Year Awards

Honorable mention, Nonfiction book, Council for Wisconsin Writers

Winner, Recreation/Sports/Travel, Midwest Book Awards

Best books for public & secondary school libraries from university presses, American Library Association

"The waves on Lake Superior nearly splattered them all over the cliffs, and mosquitoes almost ate them alive in the Boundary Waters. Halfway through the three-month trip, they buried their underwear. But who needs underwear when you’re 22 years old and living out the adventure of a boyhood dream?" —St. Paul Pioneer Press

"Distant Fires, a true-life adventure, describes a 1,700-mile canoe trip from Duluth to York Factory on Hudson Bay. Anderson and a companion retraced the paddles taken by Eric Sevareid and a companion almost sixty years earlier. Their trials and tribulations, plus Anderson’s sense of humor, make the trip fun in book form. Pen-and-ink illustrations are by noted Minnesota wildlife artist Les Kouba." —Minneapolis Star Tribune

"Distant Fires is a voyage of discovery. Scott Anderson is an inquisitive traveler, and when he sees something that piques his interest, he stops for a chat. He also has a marvelous eye for the natural world that surrounds him in his summerlong journey. He is a natural-born writer." —Duluth News Tribune

"Some of [Anderson’s] phrasing is very happy indeed: ‘the resting place of the rivers.’ I wish I had written that." —Eric Sevareid

Exploring the Big Woods: A Guide to the Last Great Forest of Eastern Arkansas is both a natural history and a guide to one of the last remnants of Mississippi bottomland forest, an ecosystem that once stretched from southern Illinois to the Gulf Coast.

Crossed by the White River and its tributaries, which periodically flood and release nutrients, the Big Woods is one of the few places in the Mississippi River Valley where this life-giving flood cycle persists. As a result, it is home to an unusual abundance of animals and plants.

Immense cypresses, hickories, sweetgums, oaks, and sycamores; millions of migrating waterfowl; incredible scenery; and the complex relationship between humans and nature are all to be discovered here.

Exploring the Big Woods will introduce readers to the natural features, plants, animals, and hiking and canoeing trails going deep into the forests and swamps of this rare and beautiful natural resource.

With more than 200,000 visitors annually, the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness is among the most alluring wilderness areas in the country, unique because it is most often explored by canoe. Comprised of more than one million acres, the BWCAW is an exceptional combination of expansive wilderness, abundant wildlife, and fascinating natural and human history. Exploring the Boundary Waters is the most comprehensive trip planner to the BWCAW, giving travelers an overview of each entry point into the wilderness area as well as detailed descriptions of more than one hundred specific routes - including a ranking of their difficulty level and maps that feature the major waterways, portages, and the designated campsites. The book is crafted so that readers can design their own route through the almost inexhaustible network of lakes and streams. Daniel Pauly, Boundary Waters expert, worked with the U.S. Forest Service, the Minnesota DNR, and local outfitters to gather information about how to obtain a permit, the rules and regulations of the park, safety tips, and how to help maintain the ecological integrity of the wilderness. As engaging as it is informative, Exploring the Boundary Waters not only contributes advice on the pros and cons of each route, but also brings the reader a natural and historical context for the journey by offering insight into the pictographs, mining sites, logging railroads, and ruins one may encounter throughout his or her expedition. With its accessible and personal style, Exploring the Boundary Waters is the perfect guide for anyone - novice or seasoned veteran - arranging a trip to the BWCAW. A companion Web site, http://www.boundarywatersguide.com, presents useful information that can be downloaded for planning a trip, including gear lists, overview maps, and route updates.

Inspired by August Derleth’s seminal book The Wisconsin, Richard D. Cornell traveled the Chippewa River from its two sources south of Ashland to where it joins the Mississippi. Over several decades he returned time and again in his red canoe to immerse himself in the stories of the Chippewa River and document its valley, from the Ojibwe and early fur traders and lumbermen to the varied and hopeful communities of today. Cornell shares tales of such historical figures as legendary Ojibwe leader Chief Buffalo, world famous wrestler Charlie Fisher, and supercomputer innovator Seymour Cray, along with the lesser-known stories of local luminaries such as Dr. John "Little Bird" Anderson. Cornell gathered firsthand stories from diners and dives, local museums and landmarks, quaint small-town newspaper offices, and the homes of old-timers and local historians. Through his conversations with ordinary people, he gets at the heart of the Chippewa and shares a history of the river that is both one of a kind and deeply personal.

“The story is the Columbia River, not the canoe and me, but I’ve learned that friends can’t hear me tell about the river until they know why I was out there. This is not an adventure story, though some adventure was unavoidable, and I didn’t set out to find myself if I could help it. Nor did I launch the trip with a large point to prove. It was a voyage of discovery, and its telling is the uncovering of surprise on a river I thought I knew…” —Robin Cody, from the prologue

On a June morning in 1990, high up in the Canadian Rockies, Robin Cody pushed his sixteen-foot Kevlar canoe through tall grass and mud to launch it on peaceful Columbia Lake, the nominal source of the river that heaves more water into the Pacific ocean than any other in North or South America. For the next eighty-two days, Cody would portage massive dams and revel in the rapids as the great river plunges 2,700 feet in 1,200 miles before reaching the river’s mouth in Astoria.

Cody’s canoe sneaks up on the bear and moose and raptors and beavers who make a living on the Columbia. He drops in on riverpeople: the trapper, the wind surfer, the archeologist, the lock operator, the native woman who grew up at riverside in a dwelling of tule reeds. With a generous and infectious spirit, Cody draws us into the mysteries of a much-altered and regulated river that is still, at heart, a life-giving place.

This first OSU Press edition of Voyage of a Summer Sun—winner of the Pacific Northwest Booksellers Association Book Award and the Oregon Book Award, and an Oregon State Library choice for “150 Books for the Oregon Sesquicentennial”—includes a new afterword by the author.

The Boundary Waters region of Minnesota and Ontario is a vast wilderness of quiet beauty, visited and loved by many, but home to only a rugged few. In 1928, Justine Kerfoot arrived, a Northwestern University graduate student headed for medical school until her family lost both their Illinois homes in the stock market crash. Thrust into year-round life at her mother's fledgling summer resort, Justine was confronted with learning survival in the frigid north woods, a challenge she met with extraordinary verve and recounts with great candor and humor in this remarkable book. As she relates her lessons from the Canadian Indians across the lake-how to paddle a canoe, hunt moose, drive a dog team, and stay warm at minus 40 degrees-Kerfoot gives us a rich sense of the world of the Indians and fur trappers. Telling the story of settlement in this rough resort area fifty miles from a town, she describes the effects of depression and forest fires and the struggles for modernization in the wild. Kerfoot has paddled all the lakes and streams in this border country, and she knows them well. Her lyrical descriptions of wildlife and seasonal environments express the deep reverence for nature that has become her way of life. In a final chapter, she reflects on the impact of restricted wilderness status on the region-called the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness since 1978-and on her own convictions about people living in the wild.