An interesting read, especially if you love traveling

books:


	• The Gringo Trail Mark Mann Green Candy Press, 2002 - 280 pages average customer review:based on 15 reviews view larger image
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The Gringo Trail

Entertaining
Educating

I rated it to 5 stars

An interesting read, especially if you love traveling

While the book did read much like a travel diary at points, it was very insightfull and introspective. It really gave me the feel of extended traveling around South America.

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Good Book, but not quite Great

I enjoyed the book, having travelled to South America myself and visited many of the places that he mentions. His political ramblings detract a little from the book. The travelogue portions were excellent.

Not something you'll find at Lunpolly

Those of you who have the vaguest interest in travel and are keen to stray further adrift than the resorts of Costa del Sol will find that this book seriously inflames such ambitions. It would not surprise me if this book were the sole cause of the 'grown up gapers' trend that's apparently sweeping the nation.

From start to finish the sheer scope and breadth of historical content is staggering. Not only is such content woven into the narrative in discrete snippets, but entire sections of chapters are dedicated to revealing the astonishing tale of the conquest that shaped South America centuries ago. It is a common belief that genocide has not been committed on a greater scale in recent times than in Auschwitz at the hands of the Nazi's. This belief is actually a myth as the book tactfully points out.

The book is a vast oasis of vibrant escapism that temporarily blots out the dull realities of your 9 - 5 office job but at the same time is ordinary enough in its approach that it implies that such an experience is within everyone's reach. Fuelled by a style that incorporates dry wit and gentle drug humour, the book gnaws its way through a landscape of polar opposites in which the troublesome trio are frequently hindered by unpredictability and their own quirky incompatibility, which eventually turns to solidity and comradeship.

The theme of freedom runs throughout the book and is strongly embodied within Mark's flamboyant expressionism and Melissa's humble soulfulness. Traits used to contrast against a background of poverty and hidden racism. A truth which the conquest did little to change.

A must read for any budding anthropologist and a should - read for any self respecting literate human.

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reviews: page 1, 2, 3

With little more than backpacks and desire for adventure, Mark Mann and two friends set out on an expedition through Ecuador, Bolivia, and Colombia, submerging themselves in Latin culture. Through dense forests, daunting mountains, and pristine beaches, the trio makes its way ? in a drug-induced haze. Soon the drugs become an all-consuming addiction that changes the lives of Mann and his friends forever. This is an engaging travelogue and frank memoir evokes the magical realism of South American literature. ?Darkly comic, ultimately shocking, and packed with astute observations.? ? Geographical

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