Showing titles in Travel Writing & Commentary

Many an incredible story may have been told about young courageous men and women cycling the globe in search of adventure, covering vast distances at speed each day with not a care in the world. Well, this story is a little different. It is a story about a 350-pound middle-aged, disabled, working-class husband and father. I was never a regular cyclist, and I knew nothing about bicycle maintenance and repair. Solo, self-financed, with no support network and without any fixed route plan other than, “I’m going that way.” What could go wrong? I wondered.

When prize-winning war correspondent Tony Horwitz leaves the battlefields of Bosnia and the Middle East for a peaceful corner of the Blue Ridge Mountains, he thinks he's put war zones behind him. But awakened one morning by the crackle of musket fire, Horwitz starts filing front-line dispatches...

Join James from 4x4earth.com as he learns about 4 wheel driving, trucks, tracks, places to go and things to do when exploring the 4x4 Earth. He looks at driving and recovery techniques, trucks, mods, bush camping and cooking, fishing and generally enjoying the Great Outdoors. Learn tips and tricks to have a great time in the places that other people can't get to. Do all of this while being safe and looking after the environment.

As a veteran traveller, Pete McCarthy has long been intrigued that the emigrant Irish can be found in all corners of the globe. Determined to pin down the mythical tales of his own clan history, Pete is thrust into a world-wide adventure that reveals an unsettled and poignant history, while...

Join John Rogers as he ventures out into an uncharted London like a redbrick Indiana Jones in search of the lost meaning of our metropolitan existence. Nursing two reluctant knees and a can of Stella, he perambulates through the seasons seeking adventure in our city’s remote and forgotten...

New York Times bestselling author of The Wordy Shipmates and contributor to NPR’s This American Life Sarah Vowell embarks on a road trip to sites of political violence, from Washington DC to Alaska, to better understand our nation’s ever-evolving political system and history. Sarah Vowell...

P. J. O'Rourke, 'the funniest writer in America', harbours a guilty pleasure – ever since growing up the son of a car dealer in Ohio, he has been crazy about cars. In Driving Like Crazy, he reveals in his love for all things vehicular. From a thousand-mile expedition across Mexico to a trek through Kyrgyzstan in the back of the Soviet army surplus truck; from an alcohol-fuelled weekend in North Carolina to an eventful journey from Islamabad to Calcutta.

Lost on Purpose is the nonfiction adventure narrative of a former technology executive who took leave of the real world to reinvent himself as a 21st-century mountain man. In October-November 2013, Patrick Taylor crossed the Rocky Mountains alone on foot. He passed through one of the largest wilderness areas in the lower 48 to reach and retrace the route of Lewis and Clark in the winter. The sacrifices - vocationally, financially, emotionally - are measured against the benefits by the author in a refreshingly honest, humorous, and inspirational fashion. 

Leaving Europe for the first time in his life, Graham Greene set out in 1935 to discover Liberia, then a virtually uncharted republic on the shores of West Africa. This captivating account of his arduous 350-mile journey on foot - a great adventure which took him from the border with Sierra Leone to the Atlantic coast at Grand Bassa - is as much a record of one young man's self-discovery as it is a striking insight into one of the few areas of Africa untouched by Western colonisation. Journey Without Maps is regarded as a masterclass in travel writing. 

Join Michael Wigge as he immerses himself into fascinating subcultures, rides with Amish farmers in old-fashioned buggies, sleeps on the street with the homeless, and, with the help from alternative lifestylers, learns to nourish himself with flowers. Wigge had only three concerns during his travels: How do I get some food? How will I get to my next destination? Where can I sleep? …all without money! This unusual travel diary combines adventure with humor and contains surprising revelations about when money is really needed - and when it's not.

Welcome to the topsy-turvy world of the anxious traveller, where panic strikes in the most serene situations, where each time you're convinced that the symptoms are in fact physical and your lungs or heart will stop working, and the only relief is a paramedic telling you that you won't die...

Julia Blackburn has always collected things that hold stories about the past, especially the very distant past: mammoth bones, little shells that happen to be two million years old, a flint shaped as a weapon long ago. Shortly after her husband’s death, Blackburn became fascinated with Doggerland, the stretch of land that once connected Great Britain to Continental Europe but is now subsumed by the North Sea. She was driven to explore the lives of the people who lived there—studying its fossil record, as well as human artifacts that have been unearthed near the area.

Travel around Botswana and learn about this wonderful safari destination as we chat with experts, tourism professionals and safari legends who share stories, recommendations and help you plan your Botswana holiday.

It'd been a long time since I claimed some solitude in this blessed landscape; since I've done without life's little props. Here I have no friend, no dog, no radio, no clock, no phone, no roof, no body pollutants.

After crossing the final mountain passes of Turkish Kurdistan, Ollivier sets foot in Iran, keen on locating vestiges of the silk trade as he passes through Persia's modern cities and traditional villages, including Tabriz, Tehran, Nishapur, and the holy city of Mashhad. Beyond urban areas lie deserts: first Iran's Great Salt Desert, then Turkmenistan's forbidding Karakum, whose relentless sun, snakes, and scorpions pose continuous challenges to Ollivier's goal of reaching Uzbekistan.

In Bucharest, Romania's capital, Kaplan discovered that few Westerners were reporting on the country - one of the darkest corners of Europe during the Cold War. In an intense and cinematic travelogue, Kaplan explores the history and culture of the only country in the West where the leading intellectuals have been right-wing rather than left-wing; a country that gave rise to the dictator Ion Antonescu, Hitler's chief foreign accomplice during WWII; a country where the Latin West mixes with the Greek East, producing a fascinating fusion of cultures.

David, a much older man now, sits on his verandah with his old friend, Nguni, as they reminisce on the good old days. Not having seen each other in almost 50 years, there is much news to tell, many stories to laugh at, and some sorrows to reflect on. Based on an untold true story, this book brings the Langbourne family's saga to its conclusion.

In To the Island of Tides, Alistair Moffat travels to - and through the history of - the fated island of Lindisfarne. Walking from his home in the Borders, through the historical landscape of Scotland and northern England, he takes us on a pilgrimage in the footsteps of saints and scholars, before arriving for a secular retreat on the Holy Isle. To the Island of Tides is a meditation on the power of place, but also a more personal journey - a chance for a personal stocktaking and a reflection on where life leads us.

An exemplary travelogue of danger and achievement by the Frenchwoman Madame Alexandra David-Neel of her 1923 expedition to Tibet, the fifth in her series of Asian travels and her personal recounting of her journey to Lhasa, Tibet's forbidden city. In order to penetrate Tibet and reach Lhasa, she used her fluency of Tibetan dialects and culture, disguised herself as a beggar with yak hair extensions and inked skin, and tackled some of the roughest terrain and climate in the world.

The tides of American history flow through the streets of New York City — from the huddled masses on Ellis Island to the sleazy theaters of 1970s Times Square. Greg and Tom explore more than 400 years of action-packed stories, featuring both classic and forgotten figures who have shaped the world.