Snowshoeing Through Sewers: Adventures in New York City, New Jersey, and Philadelphia
Select Format
Select Condition 
Book Overview
When Daniel Boone heard a neighbor's dog bark, he moved West. But when there's no Wild West left, where is adventure to be found? Michael Aaron Rockland looks for adventure in the megalopolis, "not where no one has been but where no one wishes to go . . . across traffic-clogged cities, the parking lots of wall-to-wall suburban malls, and the sinister waterways that seep through rusting industrial sites." In these ten alternately poetic and comic tales of adventure in the New York/Philadelphia corridor, the most densely populated chunk of America, Rockland walks and bikes areas meant only for cars and paddles through waters capable of dissolving canoes. He hikes the length of New York's Broadway, camps in New York City, treks across Philadelphia, pedals among the tractor trailers of Route 1 in New Jersey, and paddles around Manhattan and through the dark tunnels under Trenton. Whereas Henry David Thoreau built his cabin on Walden Pond to get out of town, for Rockland, the challenge is to head into town. As he writes, "in the late twentieth century, a weed and trash-filled city lot . . . may be a better place than the wilderness to contemplate one's relationship to nature."
Format:Hardcover
Language:English
ISBN:0813521157
ISBN13:9780813521152
Release Date:October 1994
Publisher:Rutgers University Press
Length:170 Pages
Weight:0.98 lbs.
Dimensions:0.9" x 5.8" x 8.8"
Customer Reviews
2 ratings
Great Book... Great Urban Adventures
Published by Thriftbooks.com User , 19 years ago
I was assigned this book back in 1998 when I took Prof Rockland's Urban Adventure course at Rutgers University one summer. I always got very nervous when the professor assigned a book that (s)he wrote. Was I pleasantly surprised! I was inspired, I was in awe of the adventures. I recommend this book to anyone who wants to get insprired to take an urban adventure - just walk out your door, and explore your hometown, see what you discover!
Entertaining tales of urban adventures
Published by Thriftbooks.com User , 23 years ago
I gotta give the author some credit for participating in activities than millions of Americans do every day - canoeing, biking, hiking, etc. However, very, very few Americans do this along overdeveloped NJ highways or in urban drainage ditches that were once bucolic streams, so I give Mr. Rockland many bonus points for originality.Rockland has a sharp, entertaining writing style that held my interest throught this book, and this collection of stories was a great complement to Looking for America on the NJ Turnpike, his first work.
Copyright © 2025 Thriftbooks.com
Terms of Use | Privacy Policy | Do Not Sell/Share My Personal Information | Cookie Policy | Cookie Preferences | Accessibility Statement
ThriftBooks ® and the ThriftBooks ® logo are registered trademarks of Thrift Books Global, LLC
ThriftBooks ® and the ThriftBooks ® logo are registered trademarks of Thrift Books Global, LLC
