Mountain Words Discussion: A Walk in the Park

Join us for a riveting discussion and multi-media presentation with explorer, journalist, and author Kevin Fedarko on his brand new work, A Walk in the Park: The True Story of a Spectacular Misadventure in the Grand Canyon.

The session will close with a discussion and audience Q&A with American Rivers Communications Director and Executive Producer, Sinjin Eberle.

Location: Steddy Theater

Price: Free

About the Book:
A few years after quitting his job to pursue the ill-advised ambition of becoming a whitewater guide on the Colorado River, Kevin Fedarko was approached by his best friend, the National Geographic photographer Pete McBride, with a vision as bold as it was harebrained. Together, they would embark on an end-to-end traverse of the Grand Canyon—a 750-mile journey, on foot, that McBride promised would be “a walk in the park.”

Against his better judgment, Fedarko agreed to the scheme, unaware that the tiny cluster of experts who had actually completed the crossing billed it as “the toughest hike in the world.” The ensuing ordeal revealed a place that was deeper, richer, and far more complex than anything the two men had imagined—and came within a hair’s breadth of killing them both. They spent more than a year struggling to make their way through the all-but-impenetrable reaches of the canyon’s deepest wilderness, a vertical labyrinth of thousand-foot cliffs and crumbling ledges where water is measured out by the teaspoon and every step is fraught with peril—and where there is still no trail spanning the length of the country’s best-known and most iconic landmark.

From the author of the beloved bestseller The Emerald Mile comes the rollicking and poignant account of an epic misadventure, a singular portrait of a sublime place, and a deeply moving plea for the preservation of America’s most magnificent national park and the grandest wilderness on earth.