Free Country: A Penniless Adventure the Length of Britain


George Mahood - 2013
    George and Ben have three weeks to cycle 1000 miles from the bottom of England to the top of Scotland. There is just one small problem… they have no bikes, no clothes, no food and no money. Setting off in just a pair of Union Jack boxer shorts, they attempt to rely on the generosity of the British public for everything from food to accommodation, clothes to shoes, and bikes to beer.During the most hilarious adventure, George and Ben encounter some of Great Britain's most eccentric and extraordinary characters and find themselves in the most ridiculous situations. Free Country is guaranteed to make you laugh (you may even shed a tear). It will restore your faith in humanity and leave you with a big smile on your face and a warm feeling inside.

The Wild Places


Robert Macfarlane - 2007
    He climbs, walks, and swims by day and spends his nights sleeping on cliff-tops and in ancient meadows and wildwoods. With elegance and passion he entwines history, memory, and landscape in a bewitching evocation of wildness and its vital importance. A unique travelogue that will intrigue readers of natural history and adventure, The Wild Places solidifies Macfarlane's reputation as a young writer to watch.

Adventures of a Railway Nomad: How Our Journeys Guide Us Home


Karen McCann - 2015
    We were traveling with no fixed time limit, no reservations, and only a loose idea of our itinerary. Our goal was to see if we could still have the kind of spontaneous adventures we’d enjoyed in our youth. We spent three months on trains, mostly in Eastern Europe, and the results – often hilarious, occasionally harrowing, definitely life-changing – form the basis of my new book, Adventures of a Railway Nomad: How Our Journeys Guide Us Home. "Adventurous and bold . . . full of twists and surprises." – Chris Brady, NY Times bestselling author of A Month of ItalyI traveled 6000 miles on 38 trains through 13 countries: Spain, Italy, Germany, Austria, the Czech Republic, Poland, Hungary, Slovakia, Romania, Bulgaria, Serbia, Montenegro, and Croatia. "Karen's storytelling is, if possible, even more enticing than her astonishing journey." – Alicia Bay Laurel, bestselling author of Living on the Earth

An Embarrassment of Mangoes: A Caribbean Interlude


Ann Vanderhoof - 2003
    So they quit their jobs, rented out their house, moved onto a 42-foot sailboat called Receta (“recipe,” in Spanish), and set sail for the Caribbean on a two-year voyage of culinary and cultural discovery.In lavish detail that will have you packing your swimsuit and dashing for the airport, Vanderhoof describes the sun-drenched landscapes, enchanting characters and mouthwatering tastes that season their new lifestyle. Come along for the ride and be seduced by Caribbean rhythms as she and Steve sip rum with their island neighbors, hike lush rain forests, pull their supper out of the sea, and adapt to life on “island time.”Exchanging business clothes for bare feet, they drop anchor in 16 countries -- 47 individual islands -- where they explore secluded beaches and shop lively local markets. Along the way, Ann records the delectable dishes they encounter -- from cracked conch in the Bahamas to curried lobster in Grenada, from Dominican papaya salsa to classic West Indian rum punch -- and incorporates these enticing recipes into the text so that readers can participate in the adventure.Almost as good as making the journey itself, An Embarrassment of Mangoes is an intimate account that conjures all the irresistible beauty and bounty from the Bahamas to Trinidad -- and just may compel you to make a rash decision that will land you in paradise.Source is Amazon

Metal Cowboy: Tales from the Road Less Pedaled


Joe Kurmaskie - 1999
    In this big-hearted collection of stories, Joe -- dubbed the "Metal Cowboy" by a blind rancher he encountered one icy morning in Idaho -- tells of his whimsical, wild adventures through the American landscape.

Campervan Kama Sutra: Outback Australia, with a camper trailer, three kids and a dog.*


John Perrier - 2015
     Our intrepid adventurers work their way through numerous mishaps, including, but not limited to, an ill-advised river crossing, an inappropriately packed roof rack and some truly horrible singing. During their journey they stumble across a motley assortment of characters such as a confused check-in clerk, a grey nomad with an eye for detail regarding torches, and several Crazy Germans. While reading Campervan Kama Sutra, you’ll not only fall in love with Australia’s vast, ever-changing countryside, but you’ll also delight in the tragicomedy that arrives with unerring regularity. You’ll laugh until something hurts. *P.S. There was no dog.

Restless: Memoir of an Incurable Traveller


Heather Hackett - 2020
    They filled them with a deep longing to see the world and little else.It began in 1983, a time before the Internet, Instagram or Skyscanner. It was a journey of connections with people and situations that stretched the limits of their patience and perseverance. It was often hard and sometimes dangerous. But it was a journey of self-discovery, to places where simple choices led to profound transformation, where anything was possible if you just believed in yourself and the power in your hands and heart.Grab your copy today and follow the path of this young woman who set out to find herself in the world and find answers to the eternal questions who am I and why am I here?

Ten Years a Nomad: A Traveler's Journey Home


Matthew Kepnes - 2019
    "Matt is possibly the most well-traveled person I know...His knowledge and passion for understanding the world is unrivaled, and never fails to amaze me." —Mark Manson, New York Times bestselling author of The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ckTen Years a Nomad is New York Times bestselling author Matt Kepnes’ poignant exploration of wanderlust and what it truly means to be a nomad. Part travel memoir and part philosophical look at why we travel, it is filled with aspirational stories of Kepnes' many adventures. New York Times bestselling author of How to Travel the World on $50 a Day, Matthew Kepnes knows what it feels like to get the travel bug. After meeting some travelers on a trip to Thailand in 2005, he realized that living life meant more than simply meeting society's traditional milestones, such as buying a car, paying a mortgage, and moving up the career ladder. Inspired by them, he set off for a year-long trip around the world before he started his career. He finally came home after ten years. Over 500,000 miles, 1,000 hostels, and 90 different countries later, Matt has compiled his favorite stories, experiences, and insights into this travel manifesto. Filled with the color and perspective that only hindsight and self-reflection can offer, these stories get to the real questions at the heart of wanderlust. Travel questions that transcend the basic "how-to," and plumb the depths of what drives us to travel — and what extended travel around the world can teach us about life, ourselves, and our place in the world.Ten Years a Nomad is for travel junkies, the travel-curious, and anyone interested in what you can learn about the world when you don’t have a cable bill for a decade or spend a month not wearing shoes living on the beach in Thailand.

Love with a Chance of Drowning


Torre DeRoche - 2011
    . .A city girl with a morbid fear of deep water, Torre DeRoche is not someone you would ordinarily find adrift in the middle of the stormy Pacific aboard a leaky sailboat – total crew of two – struggling to keep an old boat, a new relationship and her floundering sanity afloat.But when she meets Ivan, a handsome Argentinean man with a humble sailboat and a dream to set off exploring the world, Torre has to face a hard decision: watch the man she's in love with sail away forever, or head off on the watery journey with him. Suddenly the choice seems simple. She gives up her sophisticated city life, faces her fear of water (and tendency towards seasickness) and joins her lover on a year-long voyage across the Pacific. Set against a backdrop of the world's most beautiful and remote destinations, Love with a Chance of Drowning is a sometimes hilarious, often moving and always breathtakingly brave memoir that proves there are some risks worth taking.

Without a Paddle: Racing Twelve Hundred Miles Around Florida by Sea Kayak


Warren Richey - 2010
    A reporter with a beautiful wife and talented son, Richey couldn’t imagine how it could be any better....Then his marriage falls apart and he can’t imagine how it could be any worse.The divorce leaves Richey questioning everything, while struggling to find a way forward. To get his bearings, he enters the first Ultimate Florida Challenge, an all-out twelve-hundred-mile kayak race around Florida.The UFC is less of a race than it is a dare or a threat. The thirty-day deadline sets a grueling, twenty-four-hour-a-day pace through shark- , alligator- , and even python-infested waters. But those twelve hundred miles are only a fraction of a journey that pulls Richey back to when he was embedded with troops in Iraq, reporting on missing children, and hiking the mountains of Montana with his son, and shows him where he went wrong, where he went right, and how to do it better the second time around.Warren Richey’s memoir Without a Paddle is a remarkable physical and emotional journey that cuts to the heart of what it means to be a man, a husband, and a father.

Catfish and Mandala: A Two-Wheeled Voyage Through the Landscape and Memory of Vietnam


Andrew X. Pham - 1999
    Andrew X. Pham was born in Vietnam and raised in California. His father had been a POW of the Vietcong; his family came to America as "boat people." Following the suicide of his sister, Pham quit his job, sold all of his possessions, and embarked on a year-long bicycle journey that took him through the Mexican desert, around a thousand-mile loop from Narita to Kyoto in Japan; and, after five months and 2,357 miles, to Saigon, where he finds "nothing familiar in the bombed-out darkness." In Vietnam, he's taken for Japanese or Korean by his countrymen, except, of course, by his relatives, who doubt that as a Vietnamese he has the stamina to complete his journey ("Only Westerners can do it"); and in the United States he's considered anything but American. A vibrant, picaresque memoir written with narrative flair and an eye-opening sense of adventure, Catfish and Mandala is an unforgettable search for cultural identity.

Jaguars Ripped My Flesh


Tim Cahill - 1987
    "Cahill . . . (writes) with the precision ofJohn McPhee and Joan Didion tempered by a Monty Pythonesque sense of the absurd."--San Diego Union-Tribune.

The Longest Way Home: One Man's Quest for the Courage to Settle Down


Andrew McCarthy - 2012
    Unable to commit to his fiancée of nearly four years—and with no clear understanding of what’s holding him back—Andrew McCarthy finds himself at a crossroads, plagued by doubts that have clung to him for a lifetime. Something in his character has kept him always at a distance, preventing him from giving himself wholeheartedly to the woman he loves and from becoming the father that he knows his children deserve. So before he loses everything he cares about, Andrew sets out to look for answers. Hobbling up the treacherous slopes of Mt. Kilimanjaro, dodging gregarious passengers aboard an Amazonian riverboat, and trudging through dense Costa Rican rain forests—Andrew takes us on exotic trips to some of the world’s most beautiful places, but his real journey is one of the spirit. On his soul-searching voyages, Andrew traces the path from his New Jersey roots, where acting saved his life—and early fame almost took it away—to his transformation into a leading travel writer. He faces the real costs of his early success and lays bare the evolving nature of his relationships with women. He explores a strained bond with his father, and how this complex dynamic shapes his own identity as a parent. Andrew charts his journey from ambivalence to confidence, from infidelity and recklessness to acceptance and a deeper understanding of the internal conflicts of his life. A gifted writer with an unsparing eye, Andrew relishes bizarre encounters with the characters whom he encounters, allowing them to challenge him in unexpected ways. He gets into peculiar, even dangerous situations that put him to the test—with mixed results. Disarmingly likable, Andrew is open, honest, and authentic on every page, and what emerges is an intimate memoir of self-discovery and an unforgettable love song to the woman who would be his wife.

Old Glory: A Voyage Down the Mississippi


Jonathan Raban - 1981
    The author of Bad Land realizes a lifelong dream as he navigates the waters of the Mississippi River in a spartan sixteen-foot motorboat, producing yet another masterpiece of contemporary American travel writing.  In the course of his voyage, Raban records the mercurial caprices of the river and the astonishingly varied lives of the people who live along its banks.  Whether he is fishing for walleye or hunting coon, discussing theology in Prairie Du Chien or race relations in Memphis, he is an expert observer of the heartyland's estrangement from America's capitals ot power and culture, and its helpless nostalgia for its lost past.  Witty, elegaic, and magnificently erudite, Old Glory is as filled with strong currents as the Mississippi itself.

Grounded: A Down to Earth Journey Around the World


Seth Stevenson - 2010
    In this age of globalism and high-speed travel, Seth Stevenson, the witty, thoughtful Slate columnist, takes us back to a time when travel meant putting one foot in front of the other, racing to make connections between trains and buses in remote transit stations, and wading through the chaos that most long-haul travelers float 35,000 feet above. Stevenson winds his way around the world by biking, walking, hiking, riding in rickshaws, freight ships, cruise ships, ancient ferries, buses, and the Trans-Siberian Railway-but never gets on an airplane.He finds that from the ground, one sees the world anew-with a deeper understanding of time, distance, and the vastness of the earth. In this sensational travelogue, each step of the journey is an adventure, full of unexpected revelations in every new port, at every bend in the railroad tracks, and around every street corner.