MEXICAN & CENTRAL EXPEDITIONS by Wayne trus- 
sing, 11120 Raphel Road, Upper Falls, MD 21156 
(301) 592-7247— White water Rafting— Volcanic 
Climbs— Backpacking— Jungle Exploration— Over- 
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NATURALIST GUIDED FIELD SEMINARS and tours. 
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NATURE PHOTOGRAPHY field work and instruction 
adventure vacations to remote areas throughout the 
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NATURE TOURS emphasizing birds, wildflowers, mam- 
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ORIENTAL ECLIPSE EXPRESS China— Mongolia— Si- 
beria Hong Kong, Nanking, Sian, Peking, Ulan Bator, 
Lake Baikal, Irkutsk, and Bratsk View 31 July 1981 
Solar Eclipse 21 days-$3595 Baylis-Todd Eclipse 
Tour, Claremont Hotel, Berkeley, CA 94705 (415) 
849-4333 
PERU: Unusual sites and scenes Includes pre-Inca 
cultures, two nights in Machu Picchu Forum Travel, 
Dept NH, 2437 Durant, Suite 208, Berkeley, CA 
94704 (415) 843-8294 
SAIL PRINCE WILLIAM SOUND Guided flotilla cruises 
Lessons available Whale observation Nature Study 
College credit Alaskan Wilderness Sailing Safaris, Box 
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SCOTLAND, ORKNEY, SHETLAND AND ICELAND 
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SMOKY MOUNTAIN FIELD SCHOOL Intensive 5-day 
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Natural History, and many more Co-sponsored by 
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nue, Knoxville, TN 37916 (615) 974-6688 
TRAVELEARN, SUMMER 1981 Cultural-natural his- 
torical tours to Africa, Hawaii, China, and Greece 
led by specialists in the fields of study encompassed 
within each program Office of International Studies, 
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—Phone (201) 527-2461 
WASHINGTON WILDFLOWER SAFARIS to Cascades 
and Olympics with professional naturalist Brad's 
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WILDERNESS ALASKA Cruise among eagles, whales, 
glaciers and fiords. Arctic Tramp, Box 827, Valdez, 
AK 99686 
WILDERNESS TRAILS IDAHO Backpacking, Ski-tour- 
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with us Trips for all abilities, everything provided 
We have thirteen years experience and guide only 
in Idaho Write P O 9252 M, Moscow. Idaho 83843 
(208) 882-1955 
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High Living 
by Victor B. Scheffer 
Above Timberline, by Dwight Smith. 
Alfred A. Knopf, $13.95; 288 pp., 
Ulus. 
It was the kind of assignment many 
a biologist would jump at. Find a re- 
mote place near timberline in a scenic 
region of the Rockies, a place where 
you will camp alone from spring to 
early winter. Set up camera stations 
from which you will photograph sea- 
sonal changes in (1) a pond surrounded 
by willows, (2) an alpine bog, (3) the 
edge of a snowfield destined to be 
bared in summer as a meadow, and 
(4) a krummholz, or dwarf forest, at 
timberline. Collect plants and identify 
them. Record in motion pictures the 
behavior of high-country birds and 
mammals. Make friends with the gray 
jays, nutcrackers, chipmunks, mar- 
tens, and other camp followers that 
will visit you. 
Plan daily to record your thoughts 
on tape. Tell what new insights into 
nature’s mysteries you have gained. 
Describe red dawns, lightning crash- 
ing on the peaks, and the soft shapes 
of new snow. Tell also of changes in 
your personal outlook on life, for 
changes will surely steal upon you 
after months of immersion in a sphere 
that will seldom echo any human voice 
but your own. You’re apt to learn as 
much about yourself as about the 
mountain. Try your best to enter your 
environment . . . but for God’s sake be 
careful! 
So Dwight Smith, age fifty, a pro- 
fessor of wildlife management and 
ecology at Colorado State University, 
accepted the assignment. He started 
on snowshoes in June and ended on 
snowshoes in November. He camped 
in a deserted gold miner’s cabin at 
an elevation of 11,740 feet, ninety 
miles southwest of Denver. Enduring 
painful bouts of bursitis, he cheerfully 
hiked for miles in the thin alpine air, 
often carrying a 65-pound pack. 
We learn from words that he dic- 
tated in the quiet of his cabin that 
he came from a poor family; worked 
hard as a farmer, truck driver, mule 
skinner, logger, and soldier; converted 
to his wife’s religion (Catholicism) 
twenty-five years after marriage; was 
49 before he managed to earn his 
Ph.D. He’s still a workaholic. Al- 
though he no longer hunts for sport, 
he acknowledges the historic contri- 
bution made to wildlife conservation 
by sport hunters and their expendi- 
tures. 
This book is the fourth in a series 
conceived by Alan Landsburg Produc- 
tions of Los Angeles. The idea of the 
series is “to immerse a biologist in 
a natural environment for an extended 
period, alone, far from any laboratory 
or highway.” Three earlier books dealt 
with an Alaskan lake, a Costa Rican 
rain forest, and a Pacific atoll. 
The setting of the story is one that 
Zane Grey would have called for- 
bidding — a place of drying winds, in- 
tense sunlight and ultraviolet radi- 
ation, Saint Elmo’s fire, inch-thick 
hailstones, and avalanches. Living at 
timberline on the Continental Divide 
is not easy for Smith. As late as July 
24 the ground around his cabin is often 
covered with frost in the morning, and 
he feeds two woodstoves in the evening 
to keep warm. By September 18 sum- 
mer is over, the thermometer reads 
six degrees above zero, and Smith is 
sleeping under seven army blankets. 
His visits to a doorless outhouse, the 
seat of which may be white with frost 
or drifted snow, are as infrequent and 
swift as possible. 
