One should really never say never, but... Rawicz' harrowing tale of travel across the Himalayas smacks of an overactive imagination. The circumstances and events he and his mates were able to conquer would be impossible to replicate without everyone dying, and implausible on historical grounds.

1)He consistently states that he tried to travel and average of 20 -30 miles per day walking 8-12 hours and assumes that he actually achieved such an average. It is impossible to travel through the topography of the regions he describes, esp. the Himalayan foothills and achieve anything more than about 10 miles on an exceptionally good day (on flat ground with good maps).

His average should have been about 8 miles /day. I know this since I have travelled with light pack through much of the area Rawicz describes. With a 16 kilo backpack in very good shape I was able to make an average of 5 miles across rough terrain --- and this is with enough food on established trails. Rawicz states that most of the time they were not on trails.

2) The group was pretty desperate, but why walk to British India. Surely it must have crossed someone's mind to try to find the forces of Chaing Kai Shek and get transferred to the western powers operating in Eastern China. It would have saved them a lot of walking. You might say, Well he didn't want to risk hitting the Japanese or Chinese communists. But if they knew about the communists or the Japanese then they must also has known about a certain western presence and military support for China, or at least been able to find out about the political presence from someone). It might be hard to find someone who spoke a language they understood, but certainly worth looking for.

3) His climbing descriptions of the trails in the Himalayas bear no relationship to the real conditions and belie and true description of snow conditions in the Himalayas at the time of year he crossed into British India. Without maps or guides and adequate supplies, in the 1940s it was just not possible. Moreover they should have been picked up by either a Chinese Nationalist patrol or Nepalese govt. authorities long before they hit the British (where exactly he chances upon them is not mentioned -- we have no geographic details to crossreference his story.

4) He describees wandering around what is surely the Taklamantan Desert for 8 days without water. In this environment you'd be dead in 2 days, even if you were an SAS hardman with all the survival techniques in the world you would still be dead.

5) Perhaps the most damning indictment of his story is the fact that he was never debriefed by British intelligence, merely "given a new uniform and sent to Africa." What was his unit. The Polish contingent was also not in Africa, but battling up the boot of Italy. It is possible that he did join a British Unit, but since he states that his English was not good, it is unlikely the British would have assigned him with unit outside of the Polish contingent attached to the British 8th Army.

It is stretching the boundaries of credibility to believe this man walks from a Stalinist labour camp across most of continental asia (an area where the British and Russians, though allies, have traditionally quarreled) comes crawling through to a British hospital and.... surprise, surprise, no official from British Intelligence debriefs him or his mates.

Believe what you want, this is an interesting tale but as a betting man, I am sure it isn't true. As a piece of fiction it reads quite well. If you want good tales in the same genre read "Fear Drives My Feet." About the coast watchers behind Japanese lines, or the "Gulag Archipelago" to know what being in a Stalinist camp was really like. Those are real historical adventure.


A testament to the human spirit   November 10, 1999
 23 out of 26 found this review helpful

Having seen a review of this book in a literary journal I recieve, I was struck with the urge to read this testimony of hardship, loss and perserverance.

I was not disapointed when I put the book down, finished with the gripping tale of a man and his friends that can be described only with the heart, not in words. I cannot imagine the trials and tribulations of such a daring escape from the clutches of the former "Evil Empire".

Questions arise about the truth of the claims in the book, about survival, navigation and the like. To be honest, in a survival situation the mind and your will to survive and ability to live on is the most important thing a person has, and these are traits all members of the party had.

Mr. Rawicz is a testament to the human spirit, and our ability as humans to overcome and adapt, while never losing hope. His claim to having seen two Yeti are pooh-poohed by some, but I would believe it at face value. This mans integrity and spirit are beyong reproach. Let disbelievers to his story try to make a journey of 100 miles on foot with his pary's provisions and they will most certainly fail. Let a person who has the will to live make the journey, and I believe they would easily make it, with dignity intact.

It's said that you can survive three minutes without air, three hours without proper shelter, three days without water, three weeks without food, and three months without love.....

The members of this party stretched the limits of human endurance, and in the end, they had each other to help themselves along the untrodden path to freedom. The Creator was helping Mr. Rawicz along, on his terrible journey. His tale is true, and should be required reading for all children of any nation calling itself "free".


a journey that never happened   June 9, 2004
 22 out of 28 found this review helpful

There is nothing true about the story told in the book.
It belongs in the same scrap-heap as tales of UFO abductions.

The book was produced originally by a british reporter
hungry for Yeti-stories and a polish refugee who called
himself Slavimor Rawicz. The credible parts of it contain
bits and pieces of the experiences of REAL polish refugees
who suffered in the soviet union at the time, but the bulk
of the story is made up. It may even be the case that he
actually might have been in the USSR and did escape, as others
did through Afghanistan or Persia. Though among those who
did escape for real, no one remembered him or knew him in
the 1950s.

It is strongly suspected that the british "translator" (or
in reality co-author) created the path of his journey out
through Tibet and India so he could insert the material about
the snowman sighting for his own purposes.

In the 1950s when the story was fresh, British Officials in
India were found and asked about it. The polish exile records
were searched. Nothing was found. Again, when the soviet
and polish records opened up, nothing was there. The journey
itself as described makes no sense and doesn't line up with
the real geography.

Slavimor Rawicz may have actually
had a real story to tell, but since publication of this book
whatever that real story was has been lost behind a whole
tapestry of lies that is "the long walk".

Even more tragic is the bodyguard of liars and fanatics who
have promoted these made-up stories. The stories of real poles
who suffered during the same period are ignored in favor of
pulp trash like this.


Much More Than "A Trek to Freedom"   July 19, 1997
 19 out of 21 found this review helpful

This work's secondary title, "The True Story of a Trek to Freedom," is but a small clue to what lies between the covers. The chronicle of Slavomir Rawicz, a Polish cavalry officer who escaped a Soviet Siberian forced labor camp in 1941 and completed an incredible yearlong journey on foot through China, the Gobi Desert and into India is also a testament to human survival and a comforting reminder that human decency still remains in our too-often cruel world.

The book's greatest strength lies in Rawicz's ability to mentally detach himself from his experience and recount in great detail and with notable insight events ranging from the horror of his last cavalry charge against the Germans and subsequent Soviet captivity to picturesque descriptions of Mongol social customs and snowy Himalayan peaks. It is a unique blend of high drama and intrigue, anthropological commentary and how-to wilderness survival paced by a steady, no-nonsense narrative.

The overwhelming irony of this cavalryman's odyssey was that despite the presence of a raging global war fast becoming notorious for mass ethnic extermination, he received nothing but kindness and generosity from all of the native peoples he encountered on his trek. It is this alone that makes "The Long Walk" a "must read."


this is a work of fiction (its a fake)   March 30, 2004
 18 out of 27 found this review helpful

This book is total fiction. Nothing about the author's
life before he wrote the book or any detail of the journey
has ever been independently confirmed. And a great many
people have tried very hard to do so since the 1950s. Nothing
about his life can be confirmed before he arrived in england
and started telling his story.

Many people have read this book and wanted to believe him. They
have tried to check out the story but most have ended up
totally frustrated by the author's lack of cooperation
if not outright dishonesty. It can't be confirmed that he
was ever a polish officer, that he was in the soviet union,
or that he was ever in India or palestine. "I dont remember"
will work for the details of his trip through China, but
"I dont remember" doesn't work when he says it with regard
to his entire life before the 1950s.

Slavomir Rawicz is likely not even his real name.

This isn't a conclusion that I'm happy to have come to, but
Mr. Rawicz has not ever been able to provide even one tiny
bit of supporting evidence for his account of his life
independent of the actual trip itself.