13 Must-Read Adventure Books for Your Outdoor Bookshelf
When you have some free time to crack open a hardcover and escape into a new story, pick a book with roots in your home province or based in a territory that you’ve always wanted to explore. Some of these books feature historical adventures; others are soon-to-be classics from the past decade or two. Some focus on natural history; others describe outdoor expeditions that involve internal journeys of the spirit. Some contain humour, some tragedy. Some inspire, some entertain. They will all make you think.
Newfoundland
The Lure of the Labrador Wild
By Dillon Wallace (1905)
In 1903, Wallace, Outing magazine editor Leonidas Hubbard and a local guide set out on a canoe trip to explore an area of Labrador virtually unknown and unmapped. They planned to follow the Naskaupi River to Lake Michikamau, but went down the wrong river. As winter approached and they realized they were lost and almost out of food, they turned back. Not all of the party made it back.
Nova Scotia
The Tent Dwellers
By Albert Bigelow Paine (1908)
Paine (Mark Twain’s biographer) shares the exploits of a fishing trip with his friend Eddy Breck and two guides in southwestern Nova Scotia that includes part of what is today Kejimkujik National Park and the Tobeatic Wilderness. They experienced no survival issues, exploring the area by canoe, camping, fishing and soaking up nature. The author’s love for nature shines through—as does his Twain-like sense of humour.
New Brunswick
No Thanks, I Want to Walk: Two Months on Foot Around New Brunswick and the Gaspé
By Emily Taylor Smith (2021)
After walking the entire coast of Nova Scotia, Smith decided a trip by foot around New Brunswick’s coast (and Quebec’s Gaspe) was in order. It presented some different challenges: French is the first language in much of the area hiked, and she’s not really bilingual. She persevered, drawing life lessons from each day’s obstacles, sharing them with the reader and showing the inner spiritual journey along with the outer trip.
PEI
Wild Island: Prince Edward Island’s Hidden Wilderness
By John Sylvester (2009)
This book is a testament to Sylvester’s love of nature in his province. A coffee table photography book, the images are beautiful and varied, featuring photos of the birds, wildlife, plants and landscapes found on PEI, both in the interior and along the coast. With the words he writes, he stresses the importance of doing everything we can to preserve what little wild is left on the island.
Ontario
Once Around Algonquin: An Epic Canoe Journey
By Kevin Callan (2019)
A wonderful book detailing Callan’s trip around the “Meanest Link”—a circumnavigation of Ontario’s Algonquin Provincial Park with his pal Andy. It’s not just a “we-did-this-and-went-here” story. The book is full of anecdotes—some funny, some poignant—along with several observations about the changing face of the Park’s wilderness. Hard to put down and inspiring, you may want to book a flight there just to paddle Algonquin.
Quebec
Birchbark Canoe: Living Among the Algonquin
By David Gidmark (1997)
Living in the woods in the 1980s in western Quebec, north of Ottawa, Gidmark learns how to build traditional birchbark canoes from Algonquin canoe-builders. He also learns about their culture, the way they live, the way they relate to the land and the creatures that live there. He ponders on the culture being lost, fearing a day may come in the future without anybody left with traditional canoe-building skill and knowledge.
Manitoba
Black Water: Family, Legacy and Blood Memory
By David Alexander Robertson (2020)
As much an internal journey as a physical one, Robertson shares memories of growing up without his Cree father, learning of his First Nations status as an adolescent. After reconnecting with his aging father, they travel to where he earned a living on a trapline in the Manitoba bush. This tale illustrates how difficult it is growing up as a First Nations person, even when you’re not aware of it.
Saskatchewan
The Lonely Land
By Sigurd F. Olson (1961)
Olson, a Boundary Waters canoe guide, brings together five paddling colleagues from Canada to re-create part of the voyageurs’ canoe route, largely along northern Saskatchewan’s Churchill River. Paddling in 1960, the author notices the changes occurring even then, changes he fears threaten the wild places he loves. His love for the untouched wild and camaraderie of his fellow canoeists shine through in this classic trip story.
Alberta
Imagine This Valley: Essays and Stories Celebrating the Bow Valley
Edited by Stephen Legault (2016)
This collection of essays takes shape under the guidance of Alberta author, photographer and environmental activist Stephen Legault, who contributes a pair of stories to the mix. It focuses on areas such as Banff, Lake Louise and Canmore. It gathers together some of Canada’s best writers to share their thoughts, feelings and experiences about the environment, hiking, climbing, skiing, horseback riding and life in the southern Alberta Rockies.
BC
The Cougar: Beautiful, Wild and Dangerous
By Paula Wild (2013)
This book details the history of the cougar-people relationship, examining cougar attacks in North America over the last 200 years. It’s an eye-opener and a good source of information about cougars—including what to do if you encounter a cougar and want to survive. If you spend time outdoors in British Columbia, it’s an important read. Ditto if you love wildlife and want to learn more about Canada’s largest wildcat species.
Yukon
Mad Dogs and an Englishwoman: Travels with Sled Dogs in Canada’s Frozen North
By Polly Evans (2009)
Evans begins as a dog-sledding novice, but after immersing herself into an outfitter’s operations and covering the Yukon Quest as a journalist, she’s well-versed in the mushing world. The Yukon Bradt travel guide author watches the Arctic race, wondering what it is that drives mushers to experience the loneliness and discomfort of long-distance travel in winter wilderness. Once she completes a few sled trips, she understands its joys.
NWT
Beyond the Trees: A Journey Alone Across Canada’s Arctic
By Adam Shoalts (2019)
A story of determination and adventure follows Shoalts on a solo canoe trip across the Arctic, from the Yukon into Nunavut, passing all the way across the Northwest Territories. Much of the way, he’s dragging and lining and portaging his canoe upstream as much as paddling it. The writing is humorous in spots; as serious as this journey is, Shoalts never takes himself too seriously.
Nunavut
Into the Great Solitude: An Arctic Journey
By Robert Perkins (1991)
Another solo Arctic canoe journey. Perkins re-creates an 1834 trip down the Back River by British Navy Captain George Back. Perkins also created a PBS film of this 1987 trip, a difficult undertaking in the days before GoPro and digital video. It presented some harrowing moments in barren lands grizzly country, but perseverance was in no short supply. (The book refers to the Northwest Territories; Nunavut was not a separate territory until 1999.)
