"Everything I've done has been to reach physical goals,'' said Turk, who grew in Danbury exploring Tarrywile Park. His father, Amos Turk, and stepmother, Pearl Turk, still live near the park.

The subject of his latest book -- "The Raven's Gift,'' published by St. Martin's Press -- is about the wild reaches of Siberia. But it's also about Turk's inward quest for understanding.

"The real journey is the spiritual journey,'' said Turk, who will discuss the book, his third, at Danbury Library on Saturday at 3 p.m.

But given Turk's love of wild places, it's logical that his teachers in this quest were a century-old female shaman living in Kamchatka -- the Russian peninsula that borders the Bering Sea -- and a hunter named Oleg.

Turk said he met the shaman, Moolynaut, when he and his paddling partner, Misha Petkov, kayaked their way up along the peninsula during the second leg of the Japan-to-Alaska trip.

A storm at sea forced them to seek shelter in a remote coastal village populated by the Koryak, a tribe of indigenous Siberian people.

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