Everest to Arabia: The Making of an Adventuresome Life

Jaimie shows us a culture so different from ours and yet like all human nature so familiar. The emphasis and devotion that the Bedu show to religion and family values is unbelievably humbling. As Americans we want the best of everything and we want it now. A few weeks with the bedu and surviving in the desert seem to make those narrow minded views questionable at best. Jaimie can write as well as he can plan adventures. A great adventure and escape from the hustle and bustle of everyday life.

In this book Jamie takes you out of the comfort of your own home and into a world of adventure!Jamie talks about all aspects of the adventure including sponsorship & team work.Everest to Arabia tells a story about how even the most thought out plans don't go to plan and being able to adapt is a key element in success wether it be in business, adventuring or any other aspect of life.The book also has a good deal of humour in it, I found myself laughing out loud at times and especially liked the bit where Jamie wanted the scorpian to strike his team mate first so he could sound the alarm. :-)A great book, 5 STARS!

Positive reviews from two of the world's most intrepid explorers, Sir Edmund Hillary and Sir Wilfred Thesiger, mark the beginning pages of "Everest to Arabia," a sure sign that readers won't be disappointed in Jamie Clarke's own tale of high adventure. After surmounting Everest on his third attempt, Jamie turns his attention to crossing the world's longest and most forbidding sand desert, the Rub al Khali or "Empty Quarter" of the Arabian peninsula. In tribute to Sir Wilfred Thesiger, whose own sensitive accounts of the Arabian desert and its peoples have enthralled generations, Jamie and his crew decide to retrace the route of this great explorer, a feat never before duplicated by a westerner. Jamie's narrative skillfully guides us through the intracacies of the entire experience -- from "camel wrangling" training in the Texas desert, the team's initial meeting with Thesiger himself in England, the infinite trials of sponsorship and bureaucratic necessities, to the desert journey itself. Once the adventure is underway, Jamie's day-to-day account is enthralling, achieving a pleasant balance in its combination of dialogue, description, and emotion. Flashbacks to his Everest experiences are thoughtfully placed, and his comparisons of the two native peoples, the Sherpas and the Bedouins, show Jamie to be as attuned to the cultures he encounters as he is to the physical challenges of the landscape. The reader grows to know and appreciate the entire team, from Jamie's Canadian accomplices, Leigh Clarke and Bruce Kirby, to the generous and hospitable Bedouins who accompany them, and finally the colorful cast of camels whose antics never cease to amaze and amuse. Victor Hugo once said, "The desert is where God is and man is not" and after reading "Everest to Arabia" his sentiments are more clearly understood. Across long miles in Oman and Saudi Arabia, to victory on the shores of the Arabian Gulf in the United Arab Emirates, Jamie Clarke takes us to one of the most forbidding and inaccessible places on earth. It is a rewarding journey, indeed.

An evocative and mesmerizing page-turner, Everest To Arabia is Jamie Clarkes thrilling story of his expedition across the Empty Quarter on camal. Even after summiting Everest on his third attempt, Jamie's irresistible urge to explore drove him onward to yet anither incredible challenge, the inhospitable Empty Quarter.Fueled by the legendaty explorer Sir Wilfred Thesiger's stories of the Quarter and the Bedu inhabitants, Jamie, along with his brother and Bruce Kirby, embark on one of this centuries greatest and most difficult journeys across the most desolate desert in the world. Everest to Arabia is a truly fascinating read, not just about Bedu culture, hardships of travel by camal, but about the human spirit and potential to overcome our fears and doubts, our ability to ' step out of the frame,' and do something truly spectacular. Jamie's words and example tells us, the reader, to dream, and dream big. Everest To Arabia is a vivid and scorched to the bone account... Convincing... Whether Jamie is tackling the Mashadid well searching for water, brewing the perfect cup of coffee in a sand storm, wrestling with his camal, or having flashbacks of crossing the Khumba icefield on Everest, Clarke knows how to use precise detail or poetic imagery to make this epic story come to life. The pages of this book crunch with desert sand and smell of exotic lands. Jamie Clarke is one of the worlds greatest living explorers, in another era he might have been compared to Shipton or Mallory. Harrowing, relentless, honest...and thoroughly enjoyable Jamie Clarke's Everest To Arabia shouldn't be missing in anyones adventure library.