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Patrick Symmes


	Patrick Symmes

Contributing Editor Patrick Symmes has reported in recent years from Afghanistan, Mongolia, Cuba, and many parts of South America. He has traveled amongst Maoist insurgents in Nepal, profiled gangs in Brazil, and looked behind the bamboo curtain in Burma. He is the author of Chasing Che: A Motorcycle Journey Through the Guevara Legend and The Boys From Dolores. Aside from his work for Outside, Symmes also writes frequently for GQ and Conde Nast Traveler. He has appeared in the "The Best American Travel Writing" series.

The Cabin of My Dreams
Pursuing that Arcadian ideal, a faraway hideout in the manner of Thoreau's shack (while forgetting to take into account the Latin sense of time, group dynamics, and volcanoes).

The Generals in Their Labyrinth
A report from the last flight out of Burma, where, even hours before a devastating cyclone, nobody had a clue what exactly was going on.

Immersion Therapy
The world needs Anderson Cooper. And vice versa.

Red Is the New Green
Cuba has the Caribbean's largest wetlands and earth's happiest lobsters, but is Fortress Fidel really an environmental paradise?

The Kingdom of the Lotus
A not-always-mythic journey to Shambhala, over sky-high mountains and across vicious deserts, requiring boldness of heart, purity of vision, the recitation of 99 million mantras, and $45 worth of Snickers bars, party balloons, Diamox, and dehydrated soup.

Leaping Tiger, Drowning River
The devil's choice: Keep burning dirty coal, or tap into Yunnan's crashing rivers for clean, cheap electricity.

Postcards from the Edge
The year's best voices on the hottest spots around.

Slick Rick
Richard Wiese was the fresh-faced president of the Explorers Club who gave the crusty institution a media-friendly makeover. Now he's vying to be the next TV adventure hero while the club tries to remain relevant. Can they survive without each other?

The Sweetest Villains
Syria is an enthusiastic state sponsor of terrorism and a fiendish fan of torture and oppression. But have you tried the stuffed grape leaves?

A Peaceful Angle
It seemed like a good idea: Two war correspondents escape reality into far Mongolia, stalking an otherworldly fish called a taimen. But in the process of cleansing their souls with icy water and Johnnie Walker Black, they realize it's possible to stray too far from home.

The Book
You can't buy it in any store, can't send away for it online, can't meet the author (there are thousands), and you probably won't be able to read it if you do find it, since much of it is written in Hebrew. On the trail of an underground global legend: the everywhere-and-nowhere travel bible of Israel's combat-fatigued, footloose vagabond youth.

Gun It, Obi-Wan!
On a madcap lap of the planet, Ewan McGregor and his wingman, Charley Boorman, burned rubber for 20,000 bumpy miles.

The Kabul Express
In the sixties and seventies it was the hippie trail that brought foreigners to Afghanistan. Two decades of war and terror later, Kabul is a nonstop rave of C-130s, NGOs, soldiers, and spooky nation-builders. The freaks are back on Chicken Street-where everything old is new again

River Impossible
Everybody loves the Klamath. Everybody wants a piece of it. And they're willing to go to war to get it.

Blood Wood
Remember the rainforest? Fourteen years after the martyrdom

Books by Patrick Symmes

Chasing Che : A Motorcycle Journey in Search of the Guevara Legend

The Boys From Dolores

of Brazilian activist Chico Mendes, environmentalists are once again being murdered, while illegal logging pushes deeper into the world's last great tropical jungle. In this investigative report, Patrick Symmes follows the money, the mahogany, and the mafias-and goes underground to join a brave new eco-crusader with a price on his head.

The Ghost of Shipwrecks Future
Diving on lost ships is one thing. Exploring the boat that shadowed your life is a murkier adventure entirely.

The Last Days of the Mountain Kingdom
Dateline: Nepal, 2001. The royal family has been murdered. Maoist guerrillas prowl the countryside, fomenting agrarian revolution. Kathmandu has succumbed to general strikes and indiscriminate bombings. And everybody's got his own pet conspiracy theory. Is this in the Himalayas, or the next Asian apocalypse in the making?

Sheiks and Freaks
The rise and fall and exile and triumphant possible return of Rod of Massachusetts to the battle-torn bedouin Kingdom of Dahab

Chasing Mackenzie's Ghost
According to legend, New Zealand's South Island was formed when the dawn froze 150 shipwrecked gods into mountains. There are worse places to spend eternity.

From the Wonderful People Who Brought You the Killing Fields
Never mind the land mines, the kidnappings, the chaotic weirdness. When the henchmen of Cambodia throw down the welcome mat for tourism, the neighborly thing to do is come calling.

Remember, Fear Is Your Friend
And other strategies gleaned from a hike through Yellowstone's grizzly alley

After 9/11: The Rescue
Unnatural Disaster

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