New Travel Book: ‘Explorers of the Infinite’

Travel Blog  •  Eva Holland  •  08.04.08 | 12:57 PM ET

imageFull title: Explorers of the Infinite: The Secret Spiritual Lives of Extreme Athletes—and What They Reveal About Near-Death Experiences, Psychic Communication, and Touching the Beyond

Author: Maria Coffey

Released: May 2008

Travel genre: Adventure travel, spiritual travel

Territory covered: The highest peaks, biggest waves, best powder, toughest trails and the paranormal

Promo copy: “In the life-or-death world of extreme adventure sports, there is one thing that athletes often keep quiet about: the ‘forbidden’ territory of paranormal experiences… In Explorers of the Infinite, award-winning outdoors journalist and lifelong adventure sports devotee Maria Coffey probes the mystical and paranormal experiences of mountaineers, snowboarders, surfers, and more. She reviews cutting-edge science, and consults the history of philosophy and spirituality to answer the question: Could the state of intense ‘aliveness’ that is the allure of extreme sports for so many actually be a route to a connection with the beyond?”

Critical verdict, Zagat-style: “Explorers of the Infinite is littered with the bodies of climbers for whom the mountains became a final resting place.” The author “certainly has a gift for bringing her readers into a story, but there are so many similar stories here that they tend to run together after a while.” (National Post) “If you think Reinhold Messner’s yeti sightings were nutty, wait till you hear the tales” in this book. “Why do certain athletes—climbers, snowboarders, singlehanded sailors, and other hard-driving types—seem to have more spiritual and supernatural epiphanies than your regular Joe 10K? Thin air, mental exhaustion, and dehydration might be part of it. But Coffey posits a more curious theory: that athletes’ ability to push ‘beyond human consciousness into another realm’ helps them break physical boundaries, and vice versa.” (Outside)

Read: Q&A with the author

Buy it: Amazon, publisher

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Eva Holland is co-editor of World Hum. She is a former associate editor at Up Here and Up Here Business magazines, and a contributor to Vela. She's based in Canada's Yukon territory.


1 Comment for New Travel Book: ‘Explorers of the Infinite’

Nicaragua Surf 08.04.08 | 4:36 PM ET

This looks like an awesome book. I’m always on the look-out for a new travel book to keep me inspired.

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