"Finally Fram showed herself in all her glory as the best sea-boat in the world. It was extraordinary to watch how she behaved. ... the Fram gave a wriggle of her body and was instantly at the top of the wave, which slipped under the vessel. Can anyone be surprised if one gets fond of such a ship?" --Captain Nilsen of the Fram, 1912. From her launch in 1892, to the triumphant return to Norway in 1914, the polar expeditionary ship Fram sailed north almost to the North Pole, and south to Antarctica. supporting three of the most daring of all polar adventures. In the centenary year of Roald Amundsen's successful trek to the South Pole, this is the story of his ship, the Fram, and her voyages to the ends of the earth.

'This is the gripping and inspirational account of two ordinary blokes ...double-handedly proving that the Age of Adventure is not over!' PETER FITZSIMONS With more than two thousand kilometres of treacherous seas and dangerously unpredictable weather and currents, it was little wonder no-one had ever successfully crossed the Tasman by kayak. Australian adventurer Andrew McAuley had come close just months earlier - tragically, though, not near enough to save his life. But two young Sydneysiders, James Castrission and Justin Jones, reached the sand at New Plymouth - and a place in history - on 13 January 2008, 62 days after they'd set off from Forster on the mid-north coast of New South Wales. In the process, they had to face dwindling food supplies, a string of technical problems, 14 days trapped in a whirlpool, and two terrifying close encounters with sharks. When they arrived in New Zealand, their friendship stronger than ever, they were sunburnt, bearded, physically and mentally wasted ...and, most of all, happy to be alive. "...nothing prepared them for the 62 days of rapture, despair and euphoria ...ultimately this is a story of the triumph of the human spirit." Lincoln Hall

Award-winning cultural historian Iain McCalman tells the stories of Charles Darwin and his staunchest supporters: Joseph Hooker, Thomas Huxley, and Alfred Wallace. Beginning with the somber morning of April 26, 1882 the day of Darwin's funeral Darwin's Armada steps back and recounts the lives and scientific discoveries of each of these explorers, who campaigned passionately in the war of ideas over evolution and advanced the scope of Darwin's work."

The English explorer Henry Hudson devoted his life to the search for a water route through America, becoming the first European to navigate the Hudson River in the process. In Fatal Journey , acclaimed historian and biographer Peter C. Mancall narrates Hudson's final expedition. In the winter of 1610, after navigating dangerous fields of icebergs near the northern tip of Labrador, Hudson's small ship became trapped in winter ice. Provisions grew scarce and tensions mounted amongst the crew. Within months, the men mutinied, forcing Hudson, his teenage son, and seven other men into a skiff, which they left floating in the Hudson Bay. A story of exploration, desperation, and icebound tragedy, Fatal Journey vividly chronicles the undoing of the great explorer, not by an angry ocean, but at the hands of his own men.

In 1607 Henry Hudson was an obscure English sea captain. By 1610 he was an internationally renowned explorer. He made two voyages in search of a Northeast Passage to the Orient and had discovered the Spitzbergen Islands and their valuable whaling grounds. In the process, Hudson had sailed farther north than any other European before him. In 1609, working for the Dutch, he had explored the Hudson River and had made a Dutch colony in America possible.

Sailing from England in 1610, on what would be his most famous voyage, Hudson began his search for the Northwest Passage through the Canadian Arctic. This was also his last exploration. Only a few of the men under his command lived to see England again. Hudson's expedition was one of great discovery and even greater disaster. Extreme Arctic conditions and Hudson's own questionable leadership resulted in the most infamous mutiny in Canadian history, and a mystery that remains unsolved.

In 1847 Joseph Dalton Hooker (1817-1911) embarked on an expedition to Sikkim in the eastern Himalaya, a region where he would discover a huge number of botanical treasures previously unknown to the West. A scientist of breath-taking ability, Hooker would go on to become one of the greatest botanists and explorers of the 19th century and is perhaps the greatest of the lauded Directors of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. In this fascinating travelogue, author Seamus O'Brien retraces Hooker's footsteps in Sikkim, bringing alive the adventure, dangers and discoveries that Hooker and his companions experienced in the mid- 19th century. Seamus describes how his drive for this expedition came from a yearning to see in the wild the plant discoveries made famous by Hooker, who described the region as 'a perfect microcosm of the Himalaya.' Following in Hooker's footsteps, the author describes how these places compare to the descriptions made by Hooker 170 years previously, and how in many ways how little Sikkim has changed little over the course of time. Hooker was a highly skilled geographer and cartographer, and in Sikkim he created the first comprehensive map of the kingdom, highlighting mountain passes that would be of enormous strategic value in the decades to come. Some of these maps are reproduced in the book along with Hooker's original sketches of the region and plants, as well as illustrated throughout with stunning photographs by the author. This is a wonderful celebration of one of the greatest adventures by one of history's greatest scientists, and ideal for anyone with an interest in the flora and history of the region.

The book is about my own personnal account of the expedition to recover the stricken submarine Kursk from the bottom of the Barrent sea. All the problems associated working with the Russians Dutch & Norwegians on such a dangerous job.

Presenting a study of the Antarctic explorers Robert Falcon Scott and Ernest Shackleton as well as their most heroic expeditions, the author looks in detail at just how and why their individual reputations have evolved over the course of the last century. This book covers the two most famous expeditions of the heroic age of Antarctic exploration, Robert Falcon Scott's Terra Nova expedition of 1910-12 and Ernest Shackleton's Endurance expedition of 1914-16. For decades after his tragic death on the return journey from the South Pole, to which he had been beaten by five weeks by the Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen, Scott was regarded as a saint-like figure with an unassailable reputation born from his heroic martyrdom in the frozen wastes of the Antarctic.In recent years, however, Scott has attracted some of the most intense criticism any explorer has ever received. Shackleton's reputation, meanwhile, has followed a reverse trajectory. Although his achievements were always appreciated, they were never celebrated with nearly the same degree of adulation that traditionally surrounded Scott. Today, Scott and Shackleton occupy very different places in the polar pantheon of British heroes. Stephanie Barczewski explores the evolution of their reputations and finds it has little to do with new discoveries regarding their lives and characters, but far more to do with broader cultural changes and changes in conceptions of heroism in Britain and the United States.

"The thrilling true adventure of a deadly trek to the North Pole, a one-hundred-year-old mystery, and an inspiring tale of polar exploration"

"To the End of the Earth" explores perhaps the greatest controversy in the history of exploration. Did U.S. Naval Commander Robert Peary and his team dogsled to the North Pole in thirty-seven days in 1909? Or, as has been challenged, was this speed impossible, and was he a cheat? In 2005, polar explorer Tom Avery and his team set out to re-create Peary's one-hundred-year-old journey, using the same equipment, to show that Peary's team could have done what they had always claimed and discovered the North Pole.

Navigating treacherous pressure ridges, deadly channels of open water, bitterly cold temperatures, and traveling in a similar style to Peary and Henson with dog teams and replica wooden sledges bound together with cord, Avery tells the story of how his team covered 413 nautical miles to the North Pole in thirty-six days and twenty-two hours--some four hours faster than the original pioneers. Weaving fascinating polar exploration history with thrilling extreme adventure, this is Avery's story of how he and his team nearly gave their lives trying to determine if Peary and Henson were telling the truth.

More than two hundred years later, the "voyage of discovery"--with its outsized characters, geographic marvels, and wondrous moments of adventure and mystery--continues to draw us along the Lewis and Clark Trail. Stephenie Ambrose Tubbs first fell under the trail's spell at sixteen and has been following in Lewis and Clark's path ever since. In essays historical and personal, she revisits the Lewis and Clark Trail and its famous people, landmarks, and events, exploring questions the expedition continues to raise, such as, What really motivated Thomas Jefferson to send out his agents of discovery? What "mutinous expressions" were uttered? What happened to the dog? Why did Meriwether Lewis end his own life? In the resulting trip through history, Tubbs recounts her travels along the trail by foot, Volkswagen bus, and canoe--at every turn renewing the American experience inscribed by Lewis and Clark.

Robert Falcon Scott’s 1901–4 expedition to the Antarctic was a landmark event in the history of Antarctic exploration, creating a sensation comparable to the Arctic efforts of the American Robert E. Peary. Scott’s initial expedition was also the first step toward the dramatic race to the South Pole in 1912, which resulted in the tragic deaths of Scott and his companions. Since then Scott’s reputation has vacillated between two extremes: Was he a martyred hero, the beau ideal of a brave and selfless explorer, or a bumbling fool whose mistakes killed him and his entire party? Pilgrims on the Ice goes beyond the personality of Scott to remove the first expedition from the shadow of the second, to study objectively its purpose, its composition, and its real accomplishments. This Bison Books edition includes a new preface by the author.

2009 Best Travel Book (Lowell Thomas Gold Award), Society of American Travel Writers

Book of the Year Award Finalist (adventure), "ForeWord Reviews"

It was an idea born while hiking the famed Camino de Santiago across Spain. Two men shared a dream of trekking from Europe to the Middle East on the ultimate road trip. It just happened to be a path walked by thousands of Crusaders, pilgrims and merchants during the Middle Ages, a time when wars, unforgiving weather, wild dogs, and an ever changing cast of weird characters tested even the toughest traveler.

As they say, The more things change, the more they stay the same. Two modern-day travelers discover the truth when they take on that same ultimate challenge to hike the Templar Trail across 11 countries and 2,600 miles to Jerusalem. Throwing themselves out into the universe with bad maps, blisters, but plenty of optimism, they face identical challenges in search of adventure, life s meaning and lasting peace. Proving that even today, there s nothing like a little war to shake your strongest resolve.

With 44 photos, maps and illustrations

Simply one of the most remarkable adventure stories of our time... Richard Bangs, legendary adventurer, co-founder Mountain Travel Sobek

More than the mere adventure of two brave men, it is a grand and noble quest for peace... Combines a marvelous sense of Zen with good humor, and his personal style makes you feel as if you were there taking part in it all... Mayra Calvani, "Midwest Book Review"

A travel lodestone a magical quest, a warts-and-all journey This is a special book hovering above its obvious travel-shelf slot into a spot of its own. Marilis Hornidge, "Courier-Gazette," Maine

Strictly fast-forward... Wilson's remarkably attractive account will galvanize couch potatoes..." "ForeWord Reviews"

The vivid prose and passion for adventure makes this book an exciting read You can live vicariously, although I must say I am more inspired than ever to walk each day. (5 stars) "The Rebecca Review," Amazon Top 10 Reviewer

Fast-moving and inspiring Readers of Brandon s other books will be snapping this up. Great, touching and hugely interesting. Jessica Roberts, BookPleasures.com

'Those eyes. They were the faded blue of a clear winter sky, a luminous, translucent, glacier blue. They had invited me into a strange new world of isolation and loneliness, treacherous weather, icebergs and danger. And I had accepted. What had I done? I'd only met him in the pub an hour ago and I'd just agreed to go with him on his scientific expedition to a deserted island 600 miles from the North Pole. Just the two of us.' When Marie met a German professor in an arctic bar in Norway, her life took a turn for the extraordinary. She agreed to accompany him on a year long expedition to a remote, glaciated island with just two dogs for company. It would be like landing on the moon and living in a rabbit hutch. "Champagne and Polar Bears" is the true story of day-to-day survival in severe weather, adventures with inquisitive polar bears, and four months of total darkness. It also tells a story of one brave woman's personal development and a romance that developed in a small, frozen hut in the Arctic. It is a love story with a happy ending, to warm even the coldest heart.

Richard Burton makes a forbidden pilgrimage to Mecca; Mary Kingsley wanders alone in the jungles of West Africa; Fridtjof Nansen tries to walk to the North Pole; Mary Mummery describes a harrowing first ascent in the Alps; Francis Parkman hunts buffalo with the Sioux in the Black Hills. This remarkable collection contains stories from the most compelling and celebrated odysseys of the century, some of them long-forgotten classics of their time. From polar navigation to the search for the source of the Nile to the first crossing of the Himalayas to a quest for the origin of species, this book ranges the globe and captures the restlessness of the human spirit. "What emerges again and again in the writings Whybrow has compiled are not the ways in which an explorer destroys or inflates or distorts but the ways an explorer comes to see." Edward Rothstein, New York Times"

Journal of a Tour of Discovery Across the Blue Mountains in New South Wales in the Year 1813 was first published in 1823. It is a romantic and descriptive narrative of the journey to find a path across the Blue Mountains and received a great reception both in England and in Australia.

'A collection of intimate and heartfelt confessions of what love means, each with a wonderfully expressive colour portrait' Guardian 'Will restore your faith in the world' New York Post Award-winning journalist and documentary maker Stefania Rousselle had stopped believing in love. She had covered a series of bleak assignments, from terrorist attacks to the rise of the far right. Her relationship had fallen apart. Her faith in humanity was shaken. She decided to set out alone on a road trip across France, sleeping in strangers' homes, asking ordinary men and women the one question everyone wants to know the answer to: what is love? From a baker in Normandy to a shepherd in the Pyrenees, from a gay couple estranged from their families to a widow who found love again at 70, Amour is a treasure trove of poignant and profound stories about love, accompanied by beautiful photographs. 'Astonishing. Beautiful. Extraordinary. A couple of times I gasped and choked up. This was really worth reading' A Guardian reader response 'This is one of the best things I have read for a very long time. These wonderful stories really bring out what is important in life' A Guardian reader response 'Beautiful. Made me cry a little. Thank you for such honest, diverse and open stories' A Guardian reader response

From the author of INTO THE SILENCE, winner of the Samuel Johnson Prize for Non-Fiction In 1941, Richard Evans Schultes took a leave of absence from Harvard University and disappeared into the Northern Amazon of Colombia. The world's leading authority on the hallucinogens and medicinal plants of the region, he returned after twelve years of travelling through South America in a dug-out canoe, mapping uncharted rivers, living among local tribes and documenting the knowledge of shamans. Thirty years later, his student Wade Davis landed in Bogota to follow in his mentor's footsteps - so creating an epic tale of undaunted adventure, a compelling work of natural history and a testament to the spirit of scientific exploration.

In a book that has been called "a love song to nature," the author documents the latest decade of his explorations of the Baja peninsula and the Sea of Cortez. While much of the book narrates his experience as a writing professor taking undergraduates on sea kayak expeditions to the Isla Espiritu Santo archipelago each year during spring break, the book also reflects on experiences with a condor restoration project in the Sierra San Pedro Martir, and an altogether different teaching experience based in a field station on Bahia de los Angeles. While the author's intent is to evoke Baja ecologies in fresh ways, the reader comes to realize that he's also describing how education can become a transformational experience. A retired scuba instructor who turned to academics and went on to receive his college's highest teaching award, Dr. Farnsworth believes that education should be a lifelong adventure, and that explorations of the natural world should be animated by reverence and delight.

The International Space Station (ISS) is the largest man-made structure to orbit Earth and has been conducting research for close to a decade and a half. Yet it is only the latest in a long line of space stations and laboratories that have flown in orbit since the early 1970s. The histories of these earlier programs have been all but forgotten as the public focused on other, higher-profile adventures such as the Apollo moon landings. A vast trove of stories filled with excitement, danger, humor, sadness, failure, and success, Outposts on the Frontier reveals how the Soviets and the Americans combined strengths to build space stations over the past fifty years. At the heart of these scientific advances are people of both greatness and modesty. Jay Chladek documents the historical tapestry of the people, the early attempts at space station programs, and how astronauts and engineers have contributed to and shaped the ISS in surprising ways. Outposts on the Frontier delves into the intriguing stories behind the USAF Manned Orbiting Laboratory, the Almaz and Salyut programs, Skylab, the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project, Spacelab, Mir station, Spacehab, and the ISS and gives past-due attention to Vladimir Chelomei, the Russian designer whose influence in space station development is as significant as Sergei Korolev's in rocketry. Outposts on the Frontier is an informative and dynamic history of humankind's first outposts on the frontier of space. Purchase the audio edition.

EA Stowaway Ukulele Revealed: Richard Konter & the Byrd Polar ExpeditionsE is the unlikely and compelling story of a globe-trotting ukulele-strumming Brooklyn sailor named Richard Konter and his famous autographed instrument. At the height of the ukulele craze Konter was a go-to arranger for Tin Pan Alley composers and publishers.THIn 1926 Konter shipped out as a member of the crew of the Byrd Arctic Expedition. As a riveted world followed their progress (and that of their arch-rival Roald Amundsen the world's greatest polar explorer) Konter managed to get his ukulele aboard Byrd's plane for the first successful polar flight.THA keen contributor to history in the making Konter managed to obtain the autographs of more than 150 individuals both famous and unknown all of whom respected the importance of Konter's North Pole ukulele. Later Konter accompanied Byrd to Antarctica and later married for the first time at age 80 the love of his life.THFor the first time EA Stowaway Ukulele Revealed: Richard Konter & the Byrd Polar ExpeditionsE details the marvelously diverse cast of characters who autographed this little instrument presenting mini-biographies and photographs to illustrate the interconnected web of lives brought together by Konter. New archival research interviews and imaging all combine to make EA Stowaway Ukulele Revealed: Richard Konter & the Byrd Polar ExpeditionsE a spellbinding read that blends biography music polar exploration history determination courage and romance.