Travel Memoir

This is a book about ten women over the past three hundred years who have found walking essential to their sense of themselves, as people and as writers. Wanderers traces their footsteps, from eighteenth-century parson's daughter Elizabeth Carter—who desired nothing more than to be taken for a vagabond in the wilds of southern England—to modern walker-writers such as Nan Shepherd and Cheryl Strayed.

Years ago, an overachieving and harried young mother accidentally flushed her gold watch down the toilet. Time passed, but the image of the lost watch continued to haunt her, a symbol of an overcommitted life. Two decades later, propelled by a series of curious coincidences, she leaves behind her busy professional life, her cell phone, and her family to escape the tyranny of time and walk 500 miles across Northern Spain to Santiago de Compostela.

Around the time Elizabeth Gilbert turned 30, she went through an early-onslaught midlife crisis. She went through a divorce, a crushing depression, another failed love, and the eradication of everything she ever thought she was supposed to be. To recover from all this, Gilbert took a radical step. She got rid of her belongings, quit her job, and undertook a yearlong journey around the world, all alone. This is the absorbing chronicle of that year.

Growing up in the Canadian Rockies, the mountains have always been home for Jenny Tough. Travelling the world, she's always discovered commonalities with mountains—and mountain people. Her major project is to run solo and unsupported across a mountain range on every continent where indigenous mountain people live isolated from the outside, urban world. Running solo and unsupported comes with obvious logistical as well as physical challenges, but running is also a common language.

The Sturgis Motorcycle Rally is one of the biggest rallies (and most important cultural touchstones) in the American West. Diagnosing Sturgis looks at it through the eyes of a biker-MD. The event lain bare in the way only an insider and a doctor can. The people that visit the event come from all walks of life and their passion for motorcycles brings them together to push aside differences and embrace another life, even if only for a short period. This is the definitive diagnosis of what Sturgis is and its place in the American psyche.

For centuries, works of art have been stolen in countless ways from all over the world, but no one has been quite as successful at it as the master thief Stéphane Breitwieser. Carrying out more than two hundred heists over nearly eight years—in museums and cathedrals all over Europe—Breitwieser, along with his girlfriend who worked as his lookout, stole more than three hundred objects, until it all fell apart in spectacular fashion.

In less than a year, Neil Peart lost both his 19-year-old daughter, Selena, and his wife, Jackie. Faced with overwhelming sadness and isolated from the world in his home on the lake, Peart was left without direction. That lack of direction lead him on a 55,000 mile journey by motorcycle across much of North America, down through Mexico to Belize, and back again.

The Climb is a true, gripping, and thought-provoking account of the worst disaster in the history of Mt. Everest: On May 10, 1996, two commercial expeditions headed by experienced leaders attempted to climb the highest mountain in the world, but things went terribly wrong...

The Prairies Book Review says "A delightful travel memoir of Self Discovery and Empowerment." "Absolutely wonderful book. A fun read-hard to put down. A very inspirational book for any woman(particularly older) who wants to adventure out to new experiences and self discovery. Highly recommended as a well written, interesting, inspirational and fun account of new beginnings." - Janice G. "There is a plethora of books by Brits and Americans living in France. I have read many of them. I have lived in Paris. This is the most well written book of that genre that I have read. Travel Writing at ...

Building on the success of The Yarn Whisperer, Clara Parkes' rich personal essays invite listeners and devoted crafters on excursions to be savored, from a guide who quickly comes to feel like a trusted confidante. In Knitlandia, she takes listeners along on 17 of her most memorable journeys across the globe over the last 15 years, with stories spanning from the fjords of Iceland to a cozy yarn shop in Paris' 13th arrondissement.

Spiritual teacher Michael A. Singer explores the question of human identity and shows how the development of consciousness can enable us all to dwell in the present moment and achieve happiness and self-realization.

Have you ever wondered what it’s like below the deck of a cruise ship? Where the smells are often so foul and the scenery so bland you completely forget you are on a world class floating vacation vessel? In her latest and only saga, Deedee Presser sheds light on the dirty details of cruise ship living as she chronicles her absurdly entertaining, nearly complete contract as sport staff aboard the MS Voyager of the Seas. Learn why you may want to avoid the health center unless you require a pregnancy test. And discover why so many pregnancy tests are needed (hint: the place is a floating ...

The history of Iceland began 1,200 years ago, when a frustrated Viking captain and his useless navigator ran aground in the middle of the North Atlantic. Suddenly, the island was no longer just a layover for the Arctic tern. Instead, it became a nation whose diplomats and musicians, sailors and soldiers, volcanoes and flowers, quietly altered the globe forever. How Iceland Changed the World takes readers on a tour of history, showing them how Iceland played a pivotal role in events as diverse as the French Revolution, the Moon Landing, and the foundation of Israel.

After the international success of The Laughing Policeman and Cop Out, I'm back with another collection of disasters—recently unearthed travel stories that prove I should never be allowed to leave New Zealand. Armed with misplaced confidence and a talent for finding trouble, I've managed to stumble around the globe with unfortunate friends who really should have known better. From the depths of the Bornean jungle to the mean streets of Belfast during 'the troubles', I've blundered through it all, creating chaos and completely overestimating my abilities at every turn. Join me on these ...

In the powerful travel-writing tradition of Ryszard Kapuscinski and V. S. Naipaul, a haunting memoir of a dangerous and disorienting year of self-discovery in one of the world's unhappiest countries.

No Baggage is a memoir that will resonate with adventurers and homebodies alike - it's at once a romance, a travelogue, and a bright, modern take on the age-old questions: How do you find the courage to explore beyond your comfort zone? Can you love someone without the need for commitment or any expectations for the future?

When expat blogger and mother of four Eva Melusine Thieme first harbors the idea of ringing out her three years in Africa on the summit of Mount Kilimanjaro, it sounds easy. In fact, it has all the trappings of a dream vacation: no cooking, no fighting kids, and an army of porters to lug everything up the mountain. What can go wrong? Tag along as Eva takes you on her journey up the slopes of Kilimanjaro together with her teenage son and a group of hilarious South African friends.

In 2019, Tim Kaine—Virginia Senator and former Democratic vice presidential candidate—commemorated both his sixtieth birthday and his twenty-fifth year in public office by undertaking a three-part journey across the Virginia landscape as he hiked, cycled, and canoed across the state. His chronicle of the journey became an organic reflection of the extraordinary events occurring across America during that time, including impeachment trials, a global pandemic, growing racial protests, the January 6th attack on the Capitol, and more.

Have you wondered what leaving a marriage looks like after spending years tied down to the wrong man, the wrong place, and the wrong life? What it feels like to break free and be released almost literally into the wild? Reaching For Driftwood is Bacinski's journey through navigating the land of a fresh divorce (accurately predicted by a psychic medium) and all that comes with it– from walking away from a reappearing high school sweetheart to taking solo, heartbroken hiking trips in swoon-worthy locations, to falling into a painfully gorgeous age-gap romance with a man she bumped shopping ...

In the first of three essays included in this audiobook, Bill Bryson decides to move his wife and kids back to his homeland, the United States, after nearly two decades in Britain. But not before taking one last trip around Britain, a sort of valedictory tour of the green and kindly island that had so long been his home. The result is a hilarious social commentary.