Blind Descent: The Quest to Discover the Deepest Place on Earth

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Humanity is very concerned with great height. Flying, scaling Everest and walking on the moon are obvious examples. But can you name the deepest cave on earth? I didn’t think so. Neither can most people. But there are explorers who live for the challenge of finding the deepest part of our planet. The book does a good job in explaining the technique of caving for the layperson, without getting too technical. Tabor is also very good with detailing the many (many) things that can go wrong in a caving expedition, and the consequences of illness, injury or bad planning. When he is on a role, the author does a commendable job with creating tension and suspense.

they worked their way down three more vertical pitches...and finally dropped into a triangular-shaped room...with a flat, clay bottom and nondescript walls.... This was it. The bottom of the world." One GR reviewer points out that the caver who departed with news of Frieda's injury could have been the guilty party. No mentioned by Anna or the author, however. But ... would that person(if the guilty party) have left the job unfinished? This is not a book you rip through. It takes some concentration, but that is not to say that it is a tough read. It is not. It is just not a fast one. No big deal, really, in a book of this modest length.The year 2071. You are tasked with finding the pioneer team who went missing while exploring the newly opened mine on Mars. Finished this a while ago but forgot to review. If I reviewed at the the time, this probably would've gotten 3.5 stars, rounding up to 4. But with time and reflection, I'm rounding down to 3. Leisure, Travel + (2015-10-15). "This Is What It Looks Like To Summit Mount Everest Alone". Huffington Post . Retrieved 2017-03-16. Barr was named after the state of her birth. She grew up in Johnstonville, California. She finished college at the University of California, Irvine. Originally, Barr started to pursue a career in theatre, but decided to be a park ranger. In 1984 she published her first novel, Bittersweet, a bleak lesbian historical novel set in the days of the Western frontier. The first part of the book tells about the harrowing rescue effort to extract Frieda and is a heartstopping tale of extreme adventure . When Anna learns that the accident might actually have been an attempt on the woman's life, the tension mounts. Which of the caving team did it?

Anna is now INSIDE Planet Earth and not liking it much. But ... the show must go on and she signed up for it. I suppose I did too, I'm about as happy about it as she is and I'm only READING about it. My uneasiness is a tribute to the skills of the author. And deeper we go ... Having completed the demo, we've reached a significant milestone. It's been a long journey, but now we're prepared to move on to the next phase: pitching our game to publishers. Over the coming months, this will be our primary focus. As a result, we may not be able to provide monthly updates every month, since we won't be working on the base game for some time. However, we'll make sure to keep you informed whenever there's important news to share. This was an alright book. I was weary of reading it at first, since I've actually met one of the "super cavers" that this book is about a number of times (Bill Stone), and I find him to be an utter twat. I really didn't want to read a book that glorified this man in any way, shape, or form.You and a few team members began descending into a 10-mile deep Martian cave. During the descent, the elevator crashes, and only a few of you survive. In the previous monthly update, we mentioned about our demo plans. This is exactly what we've been working on this month, and we've done a lot of bugfixes, quality of life improvements and so on. We were also trying to get the new environment assets to work with the weather conditions, such as making leaves wet when it's rainy, or applying wind effects when there is a thunderstorm. There are many wonderful books about explorers and adventurers. Among them are Krakauer’s Into Thin Air, which looks at those who climb (or try) Everest and Richard Preston’s The Wild Trees, which looks at a group of climbers who seek to scale the world’s tallest trees. Blind Descent joins their ranks as an info-rich report on the world of deep-earth explorers who risk all to descend deeper into the earth’s crust than anyone has gone before, to find that deepest place. They (the cavers) knew they were experiencing one of the signal moments of history, the last link in a long, hallowed chain created by Peary at the North Pole, Amundsen at the South, Hillary and Norgay on Everest, Piccard and Walsh in the Challenger Deep, and many other, earlier great who had paved the way for modern explorers. Kasjan and his people knew: they had just made the last great terrestrial discovery." A book about a race to discover the deepest cave on earth has the potential for Krakauer-like suspense, but Tabor destroys whatever tension might be present--and there should be a lot, since spelunking is at least as difficult and dangerous as mountain climbing, if not more so--by constantly and oppressively hyping the excitement and pushing the thrill in our face. It's as though he doesn't trust the subject enough to leave it alone. One can imagine him amping up the prose describing a trip with a stroller down to the park:

You have no communication with the surface, and there's no sign of the lost pioneer team that you have been sent for. You start moving through the tunnel and see something you never expected. I think the part about his descent was crazy. I cannot imagine what that had to be like, descending the tallest mountain in the world after having lost one's vision. It was probably "the best part" of the book, but it was also funny because I did not get a sense of "danger" or "impending doom" from him. I realize he survived and there is probably that aspect interfering with any sense of danger, but I have read other books where I know the person survived and yet there were still suspenseful moments in the book. I don't know how to describe it; it is just that the tone did not completely match the dangers the author actually faced. I was not quite sure how I felt about he "justified/defended" his leaving his family to climb Everest. While he justifies his climbing mountains as a combination of how he is wired, how he is created, with his experiences in the military, he also shares how he used his mountain climbing to raise money and awareness for various charities. So it was a mix of what seemed like valid reasons for climbing (raising awareness and money) and "not-so-valid" (the thrill, the excitement, the challenge). His children crying like they did as he was saying good-bye to them, followed by his wife's struggles, and ending with his leaving a "final message" to his family in case he died did not sit well with me. Had he still been in the military, that would have been one thing. But just the fear and sorrow that he put his children through, their sobbing because they were worried they'd never see him again, followed by the justifications he gave, just did not "feel right" to me. However, each of us has "our own race to run" and has to answer for what we said or didn't say, did or didn't do, so I cannot throw too many stones (as it were). He has accomplished far more than I ever will. Unravel the secrets of the Martian underground world by exploring its vast and formidable environments. Experience full freedom of exploration with enjoyable new mechanics. I'm afraid of heights. Partly it's the crazy part of my brain that fears I will jump. Worse than my vertigo is my claustrophobia. Neither is debilitating. I've been on high ledges and in cave passages. When I think about heights, I think about beautiful views. When I think about depths underground, I think about dark and being buried.

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Thus, it was with some trepidation that I started Blind Descent. Blind Descent is a fair survey of the history of cave exploration but it is mainly the story of two caves and the men and women who explored them. It is also the tale of a sporting/scientific contest - the quest to find the deepest cave on earth. The parts that shined for me were his examples of how his Navy training helped him at certain times. Those are the types of details that make the reader care and want to read more.

I would have liked more attention to the preparations & struggles of many more situations during this adventure. I am thrilled that he has so much faith and love for his family, however the book ends up being more of a tribute to his faith and love for his family rather than his accomplishments and the climb itself. The writing itself is okay. There is no bad language, sexual content or violence. The author does talk about his bodily functions in detail at times which was a bit much. There is a lot of unnecessary detail about other events in the author's life that are not related to the main story. He always emerges as the hero in those stories as well....

Craft tools to venture into the most distant corners.

I liked the way Brian wrote his memoir. It wasn't too technical, didn't become boring and also wasn't preachy. Yes, he believes in God and tries to live a life of faith but it isn't in your face. He's respectful of the Sherpa's religious beliefs and doesn't try to convert anyone or downplay their traditions or superstitions. He's just a down to earth, outdoorsy guy who loves life and appreciates the world around him. But the murders don’t stop once the body is above ground. Anna, while investigating, dodges high-power rifle shots and finds the body of Brent Roxbury on the desert floor. A member of Frieda’s rescue party, he is dead beyond doubt. That said, I thought this was a great story...but I'm so glad my husband would never do anything like that! I've grown to really love adventure and survival books and thought this would definitely be an interesting read in the genre. I wasn't disappointed. Blind Descent tells of cave exploration adventures in 2 of the world's deepest caves. I was initially concerned that the author wouldn't be able to make me see the cave in my mind as he told the story and that the author couldn't possibly hold my interest throughout the entire book, but I was absolutely enthralled and found myself daydreaming of cave diving between reads. This particular caving book chronicles (as much as possible) deep cave discoveries in the Cheve Cave of Mexico and the Krubera cave in The Republic of Georgia. The caves are very different and so are the leaders of the expeditions. The Mexican cave is climatically normal and fairly open while the Georgian one is very cold and filled with very tight, slippery spaces. The leader of the Cheve Cave expeditions (an American) is hot-headed and lusty while the leader of the Krubera expeditions (a Ukranian) is level-headed and systematic.