Trip Tales: From Family Camping to Life as a Ranger

by Rosanne S. McHenry

What’s the wildest thing that ever happened to you during an outdoor adventure? Did you accidentally set your boots on fire? Get attacked by hungry raccoons or investigated by a curious bear?
Ever roast marshmallows and almost set your camp on fire? How do you run from a tidal wave? What’s it like to be a park ranger? What happens when you get bucked off a horse, dangled from a cliff, bitten by bloodthirsty horseflies, or fall smack-flat onto your butt while leading a group of people down a trail? These hilarious and eye-popping adventures will capture your imagination and carry you right into the experience of what it's like to be an outdoor adventurer, camper, and park ranger. With vivid descriptions of our beautiful state and national parks, children and adults alike will laugh out loud reading these comical short stories. A fun beach read, or great stories for families to share, you will love this book! Chapter favorites The Stolen Picnic Table, Rain Forest Reveries, The Magic Pond, Tent Trailer Woes, Blue Poop, Cabin Life, Bears and Backpacking, and Ranger Rules to Live By .

Winner of the Next Generation Indie Book Awards (Gold Medal Finalist), Non-Fiction Authors Award (Silver Medal Winner), and the International Book Awards ! Here are some of the many professional reviews this outstanding book has

"This is a remarkable book. I laughed. I cried. I now want to take my family camping after previously swearing that would be a bad idea. Rosanne depicts her own family with such tender affection and lucidity that you will fall in love with these delightful people and their raucous outdoor adventures. You'll also get to follow along as those very childhood experiences influence her to become a fully-fledged interpretive park ranger, caring for and sharing our nation's natural heritage. Her zeal for the rugged outdoor life, and her respect for its humbling dangers and grandeur---is positively contagious."
Genevieve Parker Hill, Author of Experience Over Stuff

"Get ready for adventure and big laughs as Rosanne McHenry regales you with tales of her coming-of-age during family camping trips up and down the Western United States and Canada. Trip Tales continue when she gives readers numerous rare, up close and unflinching views of the ups and downs of the life of a ranger---the job she was born to do."
Barbara L. Moritsch, Ecologist and Author of The Soul of Finding, Defending and Saving the Valley's Sacred Wild Nature.

"A delightful tale of adventure in the great outdoors---from childhood camper to park ranger---a life joyously lived and charmingly told with heart and humor. Bravo!"
JoAnn Levy, Author of Yosemite An Untold Tale of the California Gold Rush , and They Saw the Women in the California Gold Rush

"Rosanne's engaging stories of her family's vacations in our national and state parks are an inspiration to parents and teachers. Her adventures led to a fascination with nature, and a career as a dedicated and passionate National Park Ranger."
Kitty Williamson, Trip Sierra Club Inspiring Connections Outdoors, and a Certified California Naturalist

"In Trip Tales, Rosanne McHenry displays her stellar storytelling skills as she takes us with her on her journey from hapless camper to rock star ranger. With humor and insight, she shares the lessons learned along the way as well as her deep and abiding love and respect for the land."
Dianne Milliard, National Park Ranger, Wrangell St. Elias National Park and Preserve

"A fun and insightful read into the joys of being outdoors, and the trials and tribulations of the early life of a park ranger."
Mike Lynch, California State Park Ranger, Historian, and Retired Park Ranger Superintendent."

300 pages, Paperback

Published July 29, 2021

About the author

Rosanne S. McHenry lives in Auburn, CA with her husband, Vernon. Their home is next to the American River Canyon in the Sierra Nevada Foothills. Rosanne has worked as a National Park Ranger and as a CA State Park Ranger in many different places over the years, including the Golden Gate National Recreation Area, Mt. Rainier National Park, Auburn State Recreation Area, Marshall Gold Discovery State Historic Park in Coloma, and Death Valley National Park, among others.

Her time spent on family camping trips as a child gave her a tremendous love for the outdoors, as well as a deep understanding of how important it is to protect our natural resources. Trip Tales talks about how her childhood outdoor experiences shaped her decision to become a park ranger, and her first assignments working for the U.S. National Park Service in California and Washington.

“Being a park ranger gave me a unique opportunity to talk to people about our natural world, and to instill a deep sense of stewardship in each person I met. This beautiful planet, our Earth, is our shared heritage and we all play an important role in protecting it.”

Learn more about her at www.triptalesbook.com

Reviews

[Kristine L. · Rating 4 out of 5]

Saturated with joy, whimsy, and reflection, Trip Tales packs prodigious storytelling skills into colorful chapters that are brief, pithy and easy to digest. It’s a delightful read that’s warm and witty. Clever and catchy. Entertaining. Educational. Emminently engaging.

Structurally, Trip Tales is divided into two parts. Part I is a retrospective look at Family Camping and Outdoor Adventures. It's a charming and delicious coming-of-age tale in which the author recounts the uncertain joys of family camping in a metal trailer, a canvas tent trailer, a motorhome, and with a BYO picnic table. It chronicles big adventures - often with hilarious side trips - to state and national parks, beaches, and encounters with poison oak, voracious racoons, greedy chipmunks, curious bears, and berry picking. To name a few.

There’s also “OUCH!” and “potentially perilous journeys” that were intercepted and nipped in the bud by Dad. Ditto the effects of “progress” on the natural world.

Part II is The Road to Ranger Land. This part takes readers on a journey of discovery into what it’s like to be a park ranger, how to get there, and what it was like to be a female park ranger at a time when the field was dominated by men.

While this bright, breezy memoir will appeal to outdoor lovers and adventurers, readers of a certain demographic will especially enjoy this lively look back at lessons learned on family camping trips throughout the West Coast and Canada in the 1960s and 1970s. They were the basis for the author’s desire to become a park ranger.

I especially loved the part in which the author tells us about her arrival at my favorite national park, Washington's Mount Rainier National Park, as a summer seasonal ranger.

Vibrant, vivacious, and told with a twinkle, this book is a winner. I LOVED it! You will, too.

My Rating: 4.5

[Beth · Rating 3 out of 5]

An entertaining read, the author has a unique story to tell from remembering family camping trips to becoming a park ranger. There were times when I felt as though it was written with a thesaurus close by when word choice jolted me out of the story and into my head. I listened to this on a library digital download, and the reader wasn't great. Odd syllable emphasis and word pronouncement here and there, overly casual performance that drifted from relaying a memoir in a personal tone to what sounded like an unpractical read aloud. That sounds like a lot of criticism, but, it would be a good family trip listen if kids are older elementary and maybe middle school or patient high scool age, especially the first half that focuses on family adventures and mishaps.

[JoEy Surin · Rating 4 out of 5]

I bought this book at a local farmers market, when I found out the author was a friend of the seller and local as well, I had to get it. Not just because she was local, but it definitely looked like something I would enjoy. It was written really well and easy to read. If I were to have any negative critique, it would be, how it bounced around in timeline a little. With that said, it does not take away from the quality of book at all. This was very entertaining, and I liked how I felt like I was a part of her story. It brought back great memories of myself as a kid going camping with my family. It even brought me back to a time when I took my son to Lassen and we went on a guided tour. The Park Ranger was talking with all the kids, asking them about their favorite types of food that may come from the forest. My son said "Tofu"; the look on the Ranger's face was priceless.