Sitka's monthly book pick inspires author's visit
By Shannon Haugland Daily Sitka Sentinel
SITKA, Alaska — The author of this month's Sitka Reads book spent a year trekking, paddling and skiing with her husband from Seattle to the end of the Aleutians.
The fact that it was an unusual route, without trails, was part of the appeal. As far as they know, no one had done it before.
"It was different," said Erin McKittrick, author of "A Long Trek Home." "We don't want to do anything you can read a guide book about. If someone wrote a guidebook about it, I'd rather come up with something else to do."
McKittrick's book was this year's selection for Sitka Reads, an annual program that invites residents to read the same book.
As in years past, the program will conclude with a visit from the author, a reading at the library and a talk with students in the Sitka schools.
McKittrick's reading and slide presentation is 7 p.m. Tuesday, April 12, at Kettleson Memorial Library.
Juneau filmmaker Greg Chaney made a film, "Journey on the Wild Coast," about their voyage, using footage taken on the trip. The film will be shown April 11 at the Coliseum Theater.
The Sitka Reads program is now in its seventh year. Library Board President Curt Ledford said he heard about a similar program in Seattle and thought it would work well here.
"The concept is: 'what if everyone in Seattle read the same book?'" Ledford said. "Obviously it's not going to happen in Seattle. But the goal is get a bunch of people reading and talking about a book ... we'd like people to be aware of — and talking with their neighbors and family about — the same book."
In founding Sitka Reads, Ledford said, he didn't set out to focus on Alaska authors. But that's the way it's turned out.
The program started with Robert DeArmond's "Voyage in a Dory," and has included books by John Straley, Seth Kantner, Sheila Nickerson and Nancy Lord. The last Sitka Reads book was "Surviving the Island of Grace: Life on the Wild Edge of America," by Leslie Leyland Fields.
Ledford said he proposed McKittrick's book after getting a strong recommendation from a Seattle friend.
"I got it, read it and was enthralled," Ledford said.
He said it struck him as a book that would be interesting for Sitkans, particularly those who are interested in "exciting books about Alaska."
"I looked at some other books, but this one had so much more to offer," Ledford said. "For us Walter Mitty types, this had some excitement."
Ledford said the book would appeal to the armchair adventurer, as well as adventure travelers and outdoor enthusiasts.
"Everybody who's read it has been enthralled by it," he said. "It's a nice, easy read. Everyone is anxious to meet them," he said, referring to McKittrick and her husband Bretwood "Hig" Higman.
McKittrick, 31, grew up in Seattle, and met Higman at Carleton College through their mutual interest in the Japanese mataikido. Higman grew up in Seldovia, Alaska. Both loved hiking and the outdoors, and took their first Alaska trip after McKittrick graduated in 2001.
Although they had gone on several major expeditions together as a couple, the 4,000-mile yearlong Alaska trip was by far their most ambitious.
The goal was to make the entire journey on their own power. They started in the summer of 2007 and finished the summer of 2008
"We were about to do something audacious," McKittrick wrote in her prologue. "We were about to do something no one had ever done before. I couldn't grasp the full extent of it any more than could our most skeptical questioners. We planned it, we believed it, but it seemed as though we spent all our time proclaiming a plan that didn't feel real."
It took McKittrick about a year to finish the book, which was based on the numerous journals she filled.
The couple now live in Seldovia in a one-room yurt without running water. They have two children, ages 2 and 3 months, and run an environmental nonprofit called Ground Truth Trekking.
Although a similar trip will not be possible anytime soon with their young kids, she and her husband plan to stick to the goal they shared at the end of the trip.
She said she was satisfied with the route they took with the exception of the decision to head inland at Valdez, instead of staying along Prince William Sound. The trip included a stop in Juneau, but not Sitka.
While McKittrick is in Sitka, she will also make presentations at Sitka High and Mt. Edgecumbe High School, Ledford said.
Information from: Daily Sitka Sentinel, http://www.sitkasentinel.com/