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3.77 AVERAGE
3.77 AVERAGE
adventurous
funny
informative
reflective
medium-paced
I really enjoyed this book. It was rather long, but I finished it within a week because of how compelling the author made this story. I have read other books with a topic similar to this, and what I appreciate most is the fact that Adams parallels his journey with the history he is writing about, which makes it much more enjoyable.
My wife and I were in Peru when she bought me this book as a surprise gift given how into Peruvian history we were both getting. Mark Adams does a great job of capturing Peru through the lens of an American but sadly that’s as far as he goes.
He gets a lot of the culture and the nuances right which were on par with what we experienced. It is a great cultural reference for all the historical facts that we learnt from our guides but where this book starts to fail for me is that Mark Adams’ quest (built around mimicking Hiram Bingham’s discovery of Machu Picchu) seems misplaced. His motivations feel as if they’re hanging by a thread to somehow have a through line to the midlife existential crisis that put him on this path.
John Leviers is his guide on this journey who is inherently curious and in love with Peru and I’d love to see Peru through his eyes instead of the privileged lens of Mark Adams as the stupid American who set on this arduous journey huffing and puffing across the Incan trails comparing himself to the plunderer who essentially stole away Incan riches from the Peruvian people and was able to do so solely for the fact that he was a rich, white man in the early 1900s.
Good travelogue but nothing memorable.
He gets a lot of the culture and the nuances right which were on par with what we experienced. It is a great cultural reference for all the historical facts that we learnt from our guides but where this book starts to fail for me is that Mark Adams’ quest (built around mimicking Hiram Bingham’s discovery of Machu Picchu) seems misplaced. His motivations feel as if they’re hanging by a thread to somehow have a through line to the midlife existential crisis that put him on this path.
John Leviers is his guide on this journey who is inherently curious and in love with Peru and I’d love to see Peru through his eyes instead of the privileged lens of Mark Adams as the stupid American who set on this arduous journey huffing and puffing across the Incan trails comparing himself to the plunderer who essentially stole away Incan riches from the Peruvian people and was able to do so solely for the fact that he was a rich, white man in the early 1900s.
Good travelogue but nothing memorable.
informative
An interesting travel story and history of Machu Picchu.
Typical journalist book - a few too many details about himself. But on the whole, an excellent book. Great intro to Hiram Bingham and the site of Machu Picchu in Peru.
Adams made reading about Incan history fun and interesting. Can't wait to see what he saw!
adventurous
inspiring
mysterious
reflective
medium-paced
This book is a classic travel novel as the author retraces the staps of explorer Bingham. At some parts it is funny and descriptive. But, If you are down for a completely unnuanced take on a midlife crisis and the golden age of exploration through the eyes of a white explorer and a white author than this book is for you. I realize it came out in 2011, and does have some sociopolitically relevant commentary but nothing deep. I loved the pictures at the end and wish that they were shown throughout the novel. Very Martini explorer
Content Warnings
Graphic: Murder, Colonisation
“While inspecting the temple’s interior, he noticed that something had been scrawled on one of the walls: “Lizarraga 1902.” Lizarraga, he later learned, was a farmer who rented land farther down the Urubamba Valley.”