The first two thirds of this book were unbearable. Roberts comes across as whiney and spoilt, and not in a self-conscious, self-deprecating way. Her complaining about Erika in particular really annoyed me. I've met a few Erikas in my life, and I can certainly imagine how they might make vexing hiking companions, but Roberts was not giving her any chance, I could not help but feel she was being unfair.

I pushed on anyway, partly because, irritated though I was, I did want to find out what happened at the end, and partly because of some awareness on my part that my feelings might have arisen from some entrenched sexism. After all, Bill Bryson was just as whiney in his A Walk in the Woods, and I'd enjoyed that book enough to read it twice. The final third of this book was much better. I'm not really certain why. It felt like Roberts was complaining less about Erika - actually complaining less in general. Character development?

In the end I thought this was ok. Worth ploughing through the first two thirds to get to the end.