Travel Memoir

In the summer of 1916, Dorothy Woodruff and Rosamond Underwood, close friends from childhood and graduates of Smith College, left home in Auburn, New York, for the wilds of northwestern Colorado. Bored by their soci-ety luncheons, charity work, and the effete young men who courted them, they learned that two teach-ing jobs were available in a remote mountaintop schoolhouse and applied—shocking their families and friends.

Es ist ein sonniger Junimorgen, als Hape Kerkeling, bekennende "couch potato", endgültig seinen inneren Schweinehund besiegt und in Saint-Jean-Pied-de-Port aufbricht. Sechs Wochen liegen vor ihm, allein mit sich und seinem elf Kilo schweren Rucksack: über die schneebedeckten Gipfel der Pyrenäen, durch das Baskenland, Navarra und Rioja bis nach Galicien zum Grab des heiligen Jakob, seit über 1000 Jahren Ziel für Gläubige aus der ganzen Welt.

From early childhood, Dr. Hannah Mumby has loved wildlife, especially elephants. Her first wild elephant sighting at 24 changed the course of her life. Since then, she has devoted herself to studying these incredible animals and educating humanity about them. Hannah's field work has taken her around the world, where she has studied many elephant groups, including both orphaned elephants and the solitary elephant males. These remarkable animals have so much to teach us, Mumby argues, and Elephants takes listeners into their world as never before.

In the fourth and final part of Ernest Postlethwaite’s ground-breaking journal, our hero returns from an unexpectedly eventful trip to England more determined than ever to pursue his dream of achieving total integration into Spanish village life. What could possibly go wrong?

A classic of modern travel writing, An Area of Darkness is Nobel Laureate V. S. Naipaul’s profound reckoning with his ancestral homeland and an extraordinarily perceptive chronicle of his first encounter with India. Traveling from the bureaucratic morass of Bombay to the ethereal beauty of Kashmir, from a sacred ice cave in the Himalayas to an abandoned temple near Madras, Naipaul encounters a dizzying cross-section of humanity: browbeaten government workers and imperious servants, a suavely self-serving holy man, and a deluded American religious seeker.

In his thirty years as a missionary, Michael J. Hawron encountered plenty of danger, from a knife-wielding mugger to the ravages of a fire. In each instance, God provided Michael with safety and security during even the most trying times. While some people may insist these events are just coincidences, Michael sees the hand of God at work. In the instance of the fire that threatened Michael’s life, the Hawrons were serving as missionaries near Hong Kong. It didn’t take long for Michael to learn of the local tradition of lighting candles at gravestones to honor deceased loved ones, an ...

In 1986, fresh out of college, Gilman and her friend Claire yearned to do something daring and original that did not involve getting a job. Inspired by a place mat at the International House of Pancakes, they decided to embark on an ambitious trip around the globe, starting in the People's Republic of China. At that point, China had been open to independent travelers for roughly ten minutes. Armed only with the collected works of Nietzsche, an astrological love guide, and an arsenal of bravado, the two friends plunged into the dusty streets of Shanghai.

In July 1776 a pair of Franciscan friars, Francisco Atanasio Dominguez and Silvestre Velez de Escalante, were charged by the governor of New Mexico with discovering a route across the unknown Southwest to the new Spanish colony in California. They had other goals as well, some of them secret: converting the indigenous natives along the way to the true faith, discovering a semi-mythical paradise known as Teguayo, hunting for sources of gold and silver, and paving the way for Spanish settlements from Santa Fe to Monterey. In strict terms, the expedition failed.

Atop a hill in the rainforest of Belize, next to the ruins of a fallen civilization, a butterfly farm raises the brilliant blue morpho. What starts out as the worst vacation ever turns into a quest to learn more about the first-of-its-kind farm when journalist Diana Marcum inadvertently discovers this wildlife sanctuary, which is supported by an international live-butterfly trade.

Charley's passion for travel and adventure continues in his new challenge - By Any Means. Travelling from his home town in Co Wicklow all the way to Sydney, he will use any means he can to reach his destination, via transport as diverse as steam train, horse, boat, kayak, truck, and tuk-tuk. And of course his beloved motorbike!

Feeling stuck in his work and home life, writer Jeff Gordinier happened into a fateful meeting with Danish chef René Redzepi, whose restaurant, Noma, has been called the best in the world. A restless perfectionist, Redzepi was at the top of his game but was looking to tear it all down, to shutter his restaurant and set out for new places, flavors, and recipes. This is the story of the subsequent four years of globe-trotting culinary adventure, with Gordinier joining Redzepi as his Sancho Panza.

For 18 years Ed Viesturs pursued climbing's holy grail: to stand atop the world's 14 8,000-meter peaks, without the aid of bottled oxygen. But No Shortcuts to the Top is as much about the man who would become the first American to achieve that goal as it is about his stunning quest. As Viesturs recounts the stories of his most harrowing climbs, he reveals a man torn between the flat, safe world he and his loved ones share and the majestic and deadly places where only he can go.

In March 2022, Michael Palin travelled the length of the River Tigris through Iraq to get a sense of what life is like in a region of the world that once formed the cradle of civilisation, but that in recent times has witnessed turmoil and appalling bloodshed. It was a journey of sharp, often brutal contrasts. At one moment he would be exploring the old streets of Baghdad or the ancient ruins of Babylon. At the next he would be visiting the war-torn city of Mosul, or learning about the horrific Speicher massacre in Tikrit.

Michael Palin journeys to a vast country of unimaginable contrasts - Brazil. An economic powerhouse, it is host to a staggering variety of peoples. He starts his journey in the north, in the remote mountains and forests on the border with Venezuela, and finishes in the south at the legendary Iguaçu Falls. He travels by river-boat, float-plane and foot to visit tribes deep in the jungle, samples life in the agricultural and mining heartland of Brazil, experiences the modernism of Brasília and the heady mix of Rio de Janeiro, and ventures into the favelas.

"It’s a preposterous plan. Still, if you do get up it, it’ll be the hardest thing that’s been done in the Himalayas." Thus spoke Chris Bonington when Peter Boardman and Joe Tasker presented him with their plan to tackle the unscaled West Wall of Changabang - the Shining Mountain - in 1976. Bonington’s was one of the more positive responses; most felt the climb impossibly hard, especially for a two-man, lightweight expedition.

Having grown up on their great-grandfather’s stories, Royd Tolkien and his brother, Mike, have always enjoyed adventures. So when Mike is diagnosed with motor neurone disease, also known as ALS, the brothers decide to use the time they have left to tick off as much as possible from Mike’s bucket list, from remote camping in Norway to travelling through Royd’s beloved New Zealand. Yet, when Royd loses Mike, he discovers his brother had been writing another kind of bucket list: 50 things he wanted Royd to do after his death.

In the summer of 2012, a team of six climbers set out to attempt the first ascent of one of the great unclimbed lines of the Himalaya - the giant Mazeno Ridge on Nanga Parbat, the world's ninth highest mountain. At 10 kilometers in length, the Mazeno is the longest route to the summit of an 8,000-meter peak. Ten expeditions had tried and failed to climb this enormous ridge.

Lake Ohrid and Lake Prespa. Two ancient lakes joined by underground rivers. Two lakes that seem to hold both the turbulent memories of the region's past and the secret of its enduring allure. Two lakes that have played a central role in Kapka Kassabova's maternal family. As she journeys to her grandmother's place of origin, Kassabova encounters a historic crossroads.

Disillusioned by the corporate lifestyle, David finds himself unemployed and desperate for change. Bradley, his older, more adventurous, and slightly-wreckless college fraternity brother presents an enticing offer. Just a few weeks later, the two inexperienced hopefuls abandon society and plunge into a soul-searching sojourn to thru-hike the Pacific Crest trail, a 2,650-mile Mexico-to-Canada footpath - barefoot. At the trail’s mercy from day one, the two hikers face the endless pains of walking, rising tensions, and falling behind to the coming winter.

Stuart Woods had never owned more than a dinghy before setting out on one of the world's most demanding sea voyages, navigating single-handedly across the Atlantic. How, at the age of 37, did this self-proclaimed novice go from small ponds to the big sea? Now with a new afterword that looks back at how one transatlantic race changed his life, Woods takes listeners on a spectacular journey not just of traveling across the world, but of being tried in fire, learning by accepting challenges, appreciating the beauty of the open water, and living to tell about it.