Tourism History

An account of his journey through England – from Southampton to the Black Country, to the North East and Newcastle, to Norwich and home – English Journey is funny and tender. But it is also a forensic reading of a changing England and a call to arms as passionate as anything in Orwell’s bleak masterpiece. Moreover, it both captured and catalysed the public mood of its time. In capturing and describing an English landscape and people hitherto unseen, Priestley influenced the thinking and attitudes of an entire generation.

At once an incredible adventure narrative and a penetrating biographical portrait, The River of Doubt is the true story of Theodore Roosevelt's harrowing exploration of one of the most dangerous rivers on earth.

An improbable world beckons. We think we know Madagascar, but it's too big, too eccentric and too impenetrable to be truly understood. If it was stretched out across Europe, the islands would reach from London to Algiers, and yet its road network is barely bigger than tiny Jamaica's. There is no evidence of any human life until about 10,000 years ago, and, when eventually people settled, it was migrants from Borneo - 3,700 miles away - who came out on top.

After nearly two decades in Britain, Bill Bryson took the decision to move back to the States for a while but before leaving his much-loved home in North Yorkshire, Bryson insisted on taking one last trip around Britain. His aim was to take stock of the nation's public face and private parts (as it were), and to analyse what precisely it was he loved so much about a country that had produced Marmite, a military hero whose dying wish was to be kissed by a fellow named Hardy....

Written in 1983, The Africans is a remarkable and very personal commentary on the people of this vast continent. It offers colorful, close-up views of presidents, peasants, guerilla leaders, and merchants while tracing a vivid history of one of the most varied populations on earth. Everyone interested in world cultures will find The Africans a fascinating experience.

Mezcal. In recent years, the oldest spirit in the Americas has been reinvented as a pricy positional good popular among booze connoisseurs and the mixologists who use it as a cocktail ingredient. Unlike most high-end distillates, most small-batch mezcal is typically produced by and for subsistence farming communities, often under challenging conditions.

Can you imagine painting without Leonardo, opera without Verdi, fashion without Armani, food without the signature tastes of pasta, gelato, and pizza? The first universities, first banks, first public libraries? All Italian. New York Times best-selling author Dianne Hales attributes these landmark achievements to la passione italiana, a primal force that stems from an insatiable hunger to discover and create; to love and live with every fiber of one's being.

In Heirs to Forgotten Kingdoms, former diplomat Gerard Russell ventures to the distant, nearly impassable regions where these mysterious religions still cling to survival. He lives alongside the Mandaeans and Ezidis of Iraq, the Zoroastrians of Iran, the Copts of Egypt, and others. He learns their histories, participates in their rituals, and comes to understand the threats to their communities.

With exclusive insider status as Nikita Khrushchev’s great grand-daughter, and an ex-pat living and reporting on Russia and the Soviet Union since 1993, Nina Khrushcheva and Jeffrey Tayler offer a poignant exploration of the largest country on Earth through their recreation of Vladimir Putin’s fabled New Year’s Eve speech planned across all 11 time zones.

Netting the Sun offers a carefully crafted diversity of natural and human stories from a landscape seemingly empty and forlorn to passing casual travelers. This surprising interpretation of south central Oregon's botany, geology, wildlife, ethnography, and history reveals what a truly special place the high desert is.

In Tuscany celebrates the abundant pleasures of life in Italy as it is lived at home, at festivals, feasts, restaurants and markets, in the kitchen and on the piazza, in the vineyards, fields, and olive groves. Combining essays by Frances Mayes and a chapter by her husband, poet Edward Mayes, each of this book's five sections highlights a signature aspect of Tuscan life.

The great author Robert Louis Stevenson received a fateful telegram from his friend Fanny Osbourne in 1879, urging him to leave Edinburgh and join her in San Francisco. The penniless young writer packed his bags and boarded a ship for a long, difficult voyage across the Atlantic, taking detailed notes of the appalling conditions and struggles of his fellow emigrants.

Embark on a mesmerizing journey through the cradle of civilization with this comprehensive Egypt Travel Guide. Immerse yourself in the rich tapestry of ancient history, vibrant cultures, and awe-inspiring landscapes that define this timeless destination. From the iconic Pyramids of Giza to the bustling streets of Cairo, each chapter unfolds a new facet of Egypt's allure, offering practical insights, cultural nuances, and unparalleled travel experiences.

Richard Henry Dana called this book a "a voice from the sea". It had an influence on both Joseph Conrad and Herman Melville, both of whom sang its praises. Dana was a law student at Harvard College who decided, in 1834, to take a break from his studies in order to experience the "real world" by signing on as a common sailor for a two year voyage from Boston around Cape Horn to California. He kept a journal which he turned into a book after the voyage.

Convencido de que quizá la Ciudad de México no sea el lugar más aconsejable para vivir, pero también de que es tan intrincada y apasionante que resulta imposible abandonarla, Villoro propone este libro escrito desde la devoción del urbanita recalcitrante y maravillado que se despliega como un rompecabezas infinito: los atajos viales, el cine de luchadores, los héroes nacionales, el comercio tepiteño, la tramitología gubernamental, el enigma de las vulcanizadoras, las incontables multitudes, la ingesta de chile, los templos ancestrales.

The Oregon Trail chronicles the travels of Francis Parkman up the Oregon Trail as he records his observations of the Pawnee and Oglala Sioux. For 6 months he lived among the natives, and even accompanied them on buffalo hunts. Along the way he also recorded an authentic record of frontier life, including eyewitness accounts of the trappers, Mormons, outlaws, pioneers and various adventurers who tried to tame the Wild West.

On April 6, 1940, explorer and future World War II spy Theodore Morde (who would one day attempt to assassinate Adolf Hitler), anxious about the perilous journey that lay ahead of him, struggled to fall asleep at the Paris Hotel in La Ceiba, Honduras. Nearly seventy years later, in the same hotel, acclaimed journalist Christopher S. Stewart wonders what he's gotten himself into.

Ostensibly written by an English knight, The Book of Marvels and Travels claim to recount his experiences in Egypt, the Levant, India, and China. It describes a journey from Europe to Jerusalem and further into Asia, and the many weird and wonderful peoples and practices of the East. The author claims to have traveled in land populated by Amazons, dog-headed people, cannibals, one-footed tribes, and Pygmies.

Gertrude Bell was leaning in 100 years before Sheryl Sandberg. One of the great woman adventurers of the 20th century, she turned her back on Victorian society to study at Oxford and travel the world and became the chief architect of British policy in the Middle East after World War I. Mountaineer, archaeologist, Arabist, writer, poet, linguist, and spy, she dedicated her life to championing the Arab cause and was instrumental in drawing the borders that define today's Middle East.

Cubans today, most of whom have lived their entire lives under the Castro regime, are hesitantly embracing the future. In his new book, Anthony DePalma, a veteran reporter with years of experience in Cuba, focuses on a neighborhood across the harbor from Old Havana to dramatize the optimism as well as the enormous challenges that Cubans face: a moving snapshot of Cuba with all its contradictions as the new regime opens the gate to the capitalism that Fidel railed against for so long.