But Bella Bathurst throws a powerful, revolving light into the darkness of this historical tradition. Robert Louis was a sickly fellow, and - unlike the rest of his strong-willed, determined family - certainly not up to the astonishing rigours of lighthouse building, all of which are vividly described here. To build these towering structures in the most inhospitable places imaginable (such as the aptly named Cape Wrath), using only 19th-century technology is an achievement that beggars belief. The comparison that comes to mind is with the pyramid building of ancient Egypt. For instance, we learn that the ground rocks for the Skerryvore lighthouse were prepared by hand (even though the "gneiss could blunt a pick in three blows") in waves and winds "strong enough to lift a man bodily off the rock" and that "it took 120 hours to dress a single stone for the outside of the tower and 320 hours to dress one of the central stones. In total 5000 tons of stone were quarried and shipped" - and all by hand. It is mind-boggling stuff: you'll look at lighthouses with a new respect. - Adam Roberts

    Horwitz, a Pulitzer Prize-winner and author of Confederates in the Attic, works as a sailor aboard a replica of Cook's ship, meets island kings and beauty queens, and carouses the South Seas with a hilarious and disgraceful travel companion, an Aussie named Roger. He also creates a brilliant portrait of Cook: an impoverished farmboy who became the greatest navigator in British history and forever changed the lands he touched. Poignant, probing, antic, and exhilarating, Blue Latitudes brings to life a man who helped create the global village we inhabit today.

    Outer Hebrides, 600 acres . . . Puffins and seals. Apply . . . ”.In this radiant and powerful book, Adam describes, and relives, his love affair with this enchantingly beautiful property, which he inherited when he was twenty-one. As the islands grew to become the most important thing in his life, they began to offer him more than escape, giving him “sea room”—a sailing term Nicolson uses to mean “the sense of enlargement that island life can give you.”The Shiants—the name means holy or enchanted islands—lie east of the Isle of Lewis in a treacherous sea once known as the “stream of blue men,” after the legendary water spirits who menaced sailors there. Crowned with five-hundred-foot cliffs of black basalt and surrounded by tidal rips, teeming in the summer with thousands of sea birds, they are wild, dangerous, and dramatic—with a long, haunting past. For millennia the Shiants were a haven for those seeking solitude—an eighth-century hermit, the twentieth-century novelist Compton Mackenzie—but their rich, sometimes violent history of human habitation includes much more. Since the Stone Age, families have dwelled on the islands and sailors have perished on their shores. The landscape is soaked in centuries-old tales of restless ghosts and ancient treasure, cradling the heritage of a once productive world of farmers and fishermen.In passionate, keenly precise prose, Nicolson evokes the paradoxes of island life: cut off from the mainland yet intricately bound to it, austere yet fertile, unforgiving yet bewitchingly beautiful.Sea Room does more than celebrate and praise this extraordinary place. It shares with us the greatest gift an island can bestow: a deep, revelatory engagement with the natural world.

    Armed with a newfound swagger, the author transforms a much anticipated, romantic holiday with his wife into a decidedly unromantic, though highly romanticized roots tour with comic results. Crammed into their tiny rental car (a Fiat Crumb or some such model), the couple scour the countryside, from castles to trailer parks, looking for something more to commemorate Crawford history than a family crest refrigerator magnet - and ultimately discover something altogether richer: a thriving country with the most beautiful and haunting scenery imaginable, a romantic history full of blood, intrigue and heroism, and some of the friendliest and most fiercely loyal people in the world. Award-winning travel writer Scott Crawford resides in the British Virgin Islands. A professional educator, he has a keen interest in travel and history, which infuse his writings. Where's Me Plaid is his first book.

    More unusually, they were at the time travelling together from Moscow to Vancouver by human power — boat, bike, and foot. That day, they were examining a road atlas and in particular the labyrinth of European inland waterways it revealed. Julie traced a route of interconnected canals, rivers, and coastlines that led from Colin’s parents’ homeland of Scotland past her mother’s homeland, Germany, and on to her father’s, Syria. She said, half-seriously: We could row (yes, row, as in propelling a tippy little boat on a pond) all the way from Scotland to Syria to visit our relatives. It was a reckless sort of joke to make, given the couple’s addiction to adventure. The result is Rowed Trip, an odyssey by oar (and bike) from Caithness, Scotland, across the English Channel, through France, across the Rhine, the Main-Donau Canal to the Danube, the Black Sea, the Bosphorous Straits, and the Mediterranean. Julie and Colin each describe how the trip allowed them to test their relationship, to explore their roots, and to indulge to the max their shared taste for adventure.

    A term given to flowers of stone fruit trees and some other plants that flower profusely in Spring. Blossoms provide pollen to bees, and initiate cross-pollination necessary for trees to reproduce by producing fruit. 2. A peak period or stage of development. Covering topics including housing, health, language and culture, Riddoch looks at the way in which Scots identify themselves and how this needs to change in order for the country to blossom u as an independent nation or a strongly devolved one. Arguing that limited access to security and wealth has left Scots feeling like outsiders in their own country, this book tackles fundamental and personal issues of identity that matter to ordinary Scots. Designed to incite discussion and debate, this book will appeal to those who believe larger issues of self esteem and power lurk beneath the complexities of the independence debate and want to delve deeperBACK COVERWhat will it take for Scotland to blossom? "Imagine Scotland as a beautifully-knitted, warmth-providing sweater caught on a snag. Its wearer tries to move forward u but cannot. A pause is needed to lift the garment clear. Scotland is thus snagged. And no amount of tugging will free it from the stubborn, progress-inhibiting three-headed hook of inequality, distant control and top-down governance." Weeding out vital components of Scottish identity from decades of political and social tangle is no mean task, but itOCOs one journalist Lesley Riddoch has undertaken. Dispensing with the tired, yo-yoing jousts over fiscal commissions, Devo Something and EU in-or-out, "Blossom" pinpoints both the buds of growth and the blight thatOCOs holding Scotland back. Drawing from its people, history, and the authorOCOs own passionate and outspoken perspective this is a plain-speaking but incisive call to restore control to local communities and let Scotland flourish.

    From humble working-class roots, growing up with a mother who struggled to make ends meet and a father away at war, she had always dreamed of bigger things.After responding to an advert in the local newspaper she secured herself an interview for the Pan Am training programme, and at just 22-years-old was selected from thousands of eager young British women to begin a career that would change the course of her life. Betty said goodbye to everything she knew and boarded a plane to New York, a city full of noise, towering skyscrapers and promise.Under the watchful eye of her 'housemother', Dottie, Betty mastered the art of being the perfect Pan Am stewardess; everything from faultless etiquette, geography and safety to seamless make-up application, how to charm influential passengers and preparing five-course Parisian cuisine at 37,000 feet. But no amount of training could have prepared her for the rollercoaster of life in the air.Up in the Air charts the gruelling yet fabulous life aboard the most iconic airline there has ever been, and how a young woman from Essex opened her eyes to the world and lived her dream.

    David Livingstone? The New York Times bestselling coauthor of Survivor: The Ultimate Game investigates in this thrilling account.With the utterance of a single line--"Doctor Livingstone, I presume?"--a remote meeting in the heart of Africa was transformed into one of the most famous encounters in exploration history. But the true story behind Dr. David Livingstone and journalist Henry Morton Stanley is one that has escaped telling. Into Africa is an extraordinarily researched account of a thrilling adventure--defined by alarming foolishness, intense courage, and raw human achievement.In the mid-1860s, exploration had reached a plateau. The seas and continents had been mapped, the globe circumnavigated. Yet one vexing puzzle remained unsolved: what was the source of the mighty Nile river? Aiming to settle the mystery once and for all, Great Britain called upon its legendary explorer, Dr. David Livingstone, who had spent years in Africa as a missionary. In March 1866, Livingstone steered a massive expedition into the heart of Africa. In his path lay nearly impenetrable, uncharted terrain, hostile cannibals, and deadly predators. Within weeks, the explorer had vanished without a trace. Years passed with no word.While debate raged in England over whether Livingstone could be found--or rescued--from a place as daunting as Africa, James Gordon Bennett, Jr., the brash American newspaper tycoon, hatched a plan to capitalize on the world's fascination with the missing legend. He would send a young journalist, Henry Morton Stanley, into Africa to search for Livingstone. A drifter with great ambition, but little success to show for it, Stanley undertook his assignment with gusto, filing reports that would one day captivate readers and dominate the front page of the New York Herald.Tracing the amazing journeys of Livingstone and Stanley in alternating chapters, author Martin Dugard captures with breathtaking immediacy the perils and challenges these men faced. Woven into the narrative, Dugard tells an equally compelling story of the remarkable transformation that occurred over the course of nine years, as Stanley rose in power and prominence and Livingstone found himself alone and in mortal danger. The first book to draw on modern research and to explore the combination of adventure, politics, and larger-than-life personalities involved, Into Africa is a riveting read.

    Some are adventurers seeking danger from the back of their horses. Others are travelers discovering the beauties of the countryside they slowly ride through. A few are searching for inner truths while cantering across desolate parts of the planet. Then there is Messanie Wilkins. She was acting on orders from the Lord! In 1954, at the age of 63, Wilkins had plenty to worry about. A destitute spinster in ill health, Wilkins had been told she had less than two years left to live, provided she spent them quietly. With no family ties, no money, and no future in her native Maine, Wilkins decided to take a daring step. Using the money she had made from selling homemade pickles, Wilkins bought a tired summer camp horse and made preparations to ride from the Atlantic coast to the Pacific Ocean. Yet before leaving she flipped a coin, asking God to direct her to go or not. When the coin came up heads several times in a row, one of America's most unlikely equestrian heroines set off. What followed was one of the twentieth century's most remarkable equestrian journeys. Accompanied by her faithful horse, Tarzan, Wilkins suffered through a host of obstacles including blistering deserts and freezing snow storms, yet never lost faith that she would complete her 7,000 mile odyssey. "Last of the Saddle Tramps" is thus the warm and humorous story of a humble American heroine bound for adventure and the Pacific Ocean. The classic tale is amply illustrated with photographs.

    There are, indeed, many higher; there are many of a nobler outline. It is no place of pilgrimage for the summary globe-trotter; but to one who lives upon its sides, Mount Saint Helena soon becomes a center of interest. It is the Mont Blanc of one section of the Californian Coast Range, none of its near neighbors rising to one-half its altitude. It looks down on much green, intricate country. It feeds in the spring-time many splashing brooks. From its summit you must have an excellent lesson of geography: seeing, to the south, San Francisco Bay, with Tamalpais on the one hand and Monte Diablo on the other; to the west and thirty miles away, the open ocean; eastward, across the corn-lands and thick tule swamps of Sacramento Valley, to where the Central Pacific railroad begins to climb the sides of the Sierras; and northward, for what I know, the white head of Shasta looking down on Oregon.The author's experiences at Silverado were recorded in a journal he called "Silverado Sketches," parts of which he incorporated into Silverado Squatters in 1883 while living in Bournemouth, England, with other tales appearing in "Essays of Travel" and "Across the Plains." Many of his notes on the scenery around him later provided much of the descriptive detail for Treasure Island (1883).

    Ideal for carrying on trips through the park as well as for the armchair historian, this book includes comprehensive maps and deft descriptions of the action that situate visitors in time and place. Crisp narratives introduce key figures and events, and eye-opening vignettes help readers more fully comprehend the import of what happened and why. A wide variety of contemporary and postwar source materials offer colorful stories and present interesting interpretations that have shaped--or reshaped--our understanding of Gettysburg today.Each stop addresses the following: What happened here? Who fought here? Who commanded here? Who fell here? Who lived here? How did participants remember this event?

    Located deep beneath the heart of Greater London, the Underground is awash with more strangeness than you can shake your prepaid train card at. So, pack up your day bag and travel stop-by-stop with us on this strange and fantastic journey along the Northern, Picadilly, Metropolitan, Jubilee, Hammersmith & City, and District Line, and explore the Underground as you've never seen it before with this treasure trove of the humorous, the odd, and the baffling—an alternative travel guide to the Underground's best-kept secrets.

    In Caucasus, award-winning author Nicholas Griffin recounts his journey to this war torn region to explore the roots of today's conflict, centering his travelogue on Imam Shamil, the great nineteenth century Muslim warrior who commanded a quarter-century resistance against invading Russian forces.Delving deep into the Caucasus, Griffin transcends the headlines trumpeting Chechen insurgency to give the land and its conflicts dimension: evoking the weather, terrain, and geography alongside national traditions, religious affiliations, and personal legends as barriers to peaceful co-existence. In focusing his tale on Shamil while retracing his steps, Griffin compellingly demonstrates the way history repeats itself.

    

    A product of Northern French provincial society of the 19th century - austere, catholic and nationalist - de Gaulle was, according to Williams, the last great Frenchman. Whatever the arguments concerning de Gaulle's legacy, in his single-minded devotion to his country, and in his skill and strength in pushing it, there would have been no France if there had been no de Gaulle.