Angels along the river

the long version

Reading a book can change your life. When Eleanor Lahr read "Follow the River", a novel about the true experience of Mary Draper Ingles, who was captured in 1755 by Shawnee Indians and carried 500 miles from her home, she felt inexplicably compelled to retrace Mary's escape route. With little previous experince, but with plucky courage, she planned and trained extensively, then set off on her 51st birthday. Before e-mail, cell phones, Facebook, and Twitter, occaisionally alone, usually with strangers, she hiked 43 days along the Ohio, Kanawha, and New Rivers--publisher.