Bicycling with Butterflies Review

Just like the last book I reviewed on here, you don't know how long I've been wanting to get around to this book.

Bicycling with Butterflies by Sara Dykman is a memoir about the author's true story of how she charted and followed the migration paths of monarch butterflies from Mexico to Canada and back to Mexico again. She completed the whole journey via biking!

Every chapter of the book recounts every place Dykman biked through and stopped at. She found lots of monarchs, but all sorts of other wildlife too, most important of them all being milkweed, which is what monarch butterflies need to lay their eggs. She also talked about how and where she would find places to camp out in her tent for the nights she was on the road. It wasn't always easy! During her journey she would sometimes go to schools and universities to talk about her journey and scientific research and facts she knew about monarch butterflies. She also talked about all of the people she met along the way--both new and familiar faces. 

Dykman would also sometimes pause the story to talk about scientific facts about monarch butterflies to us--the readers. She really knows her stuff about these creatures. I could really feel her passion and care about these butterflies through the pages--especially when she would talk about especially concerning facts like how climate change and people mowing away milkweek affects the butterflies. Monarchs are just a super important part of wildlife in North America!

The book was really neat, but I did give it 4 stars. That was just because I didn't always like the way the scientific facts were written into the story sometimes. It was a little too "sciency" for me and hard to understand at times. I also think they kind of slowed the story down too much. While she is a good writer, I think Dykman maybe didn't always have to interrupt the story with the scientific facts on monarchs. Maybe she could've written them in a way that a general audience who isn't very sciency could understand them better. But that's just my opinion.

Do you like reading travel stories, too? Which is your favorite?