It tells of the writer's journey from England across Europe and Asia and the Pacific to his homeland in New Zealand. He set out with 300 pounds and travelled some 25,000 miles. It is the story of a search across the world, and a pilgrimage to many places that had intrigued him for years: a village in Sicily, ancient Ithaca, Isphahan, Persepolis, Halicarnassos, Anzac, Kabul, a mountain in Kurdistan and Mandalay. He travelled often on foot, sometimes on mule, in Greek caiques and Burmese sampans, in Arab and Afghan lorries. He followed many old roads, from Antioch to Damascus, from Kabul to Peshawar, from Ephesus to Istanbul. And he returned for the third time to his "other home" which is Crete. It is a story of strange coincidences, and of the unexpected in the unpredictable east."