In "The Missionaries", Norman Lewis brings together a lifetime's experience of travelling in tribal lands in a searing condemnation of the lethal impact of North American fundamentalist Christian missionaries on aboriginal life throughout the world.

'Forget routine; now is the time to embrace the unknown, step out of your comfort zone and open the gateway to the Art of Exploration.' 'Britain's best loved adventurer' (The Times) talks about his secrets of discovery for the first time in this revealing manual of what it means to be an explorer in the modern age. The man who has walked the Nile, the Himalayas and the Americas discusses his lessons from a life on the road, how he managed to turn a passion into a lifestyle, and what inspired and motivated him along the way. Wood explains how he and other explorers face up to life's challenges, often in extraordinary circumstances and demonstrate resilience in the face of overwhelming odds. He shares examples of pioneers in many fields, using their work to show how we can all develop our own explorers mindset and how these lessons can be applied in daily life. With chapters on curiosity, teamwork, resilience and positivity this is a book that provides a tool kit - no matter your age or profession. As Levison says, 'these lessons can help you to fulfil your potential for living a happy life, regardless of your circumstances'.

His life was a shambles, he felt exhausted by work, his marriage was foundering. So he prepared a backpack, found a walking staff and departed on a 30-day, 500-mile journey along the Camino de Santiago, the route across northern Spain that has been followed by pilgrims for at least a thousand years. He knew what he was fleeing from, not what he was seeking. The Camino would teach him that and many other things. Walking by day, he slept in pilgrims' hospices at night, in boarding houses, in abandoned schools and churches or under the stars. As he moved forward in space, he seemed to be going backwards into time. He went through country where villages and people have barely changed since the Middle Ages, landscapes that James Michener has called the best in Spain and some of the finest in the world. Although he began his trip alone, Edward F. Stanton soon discovered that pilgrimage means fellowship as well as solitude: his journey coincided with the modern revival of the Camino de Santiago. Along the way he met a Spanish astrologer who taught him to find his own rhythm in walking, the abbess of a convent who offered him sage advice for the road, a pair of French women in search of a new life, peasants and shepherds with the knowledge of centuries. Road of Stars to Santiago is a beautifully written story that blends personal experience with folklore, legend, the wisdom of old chronicles and canny observations of life in modern Spain. It is at once a travel memoir, a picaresque adventure, a modern quest, a rite of passage and initiation into what has been called "the premier cultural route of Europe".

'Crackles and sparks with life like an exploding box of Diwali fireworks' -William Dalrymple 'One can only envy Monisha Rajesh as she embarks on this epic journey' -Tim Parks When she was a child, Monisha Rajesh's family uprooted to Madras in the hope of making India their home, but soon returned to England with a bitter taste in their mouths. Two decades on, Monisha turns to a map of the Indian Railways and takes a page out of Jules Verne's classic tale, embarking on an adventure around India in 80 trains, covering 40,000km - the circumference of the Earth. Her journey takes her on toy trains, luxury trains, Mumbai's infamous commuter trains and even a hospital on wheels. Along the way she meets a kaleidoscope of characters and discovers why the railways are considered the lifeline that keeps the country's heart beating. Most of all, she hopes that these 80 train journeys will lift the veil on a country that has become a stranger to her.

'I come from Des Moines. Somebody had to' And, as soon as Bill Bryson was old enough, he left. Des Moines couldn't hold him, but it did lure him back. After ten years in England, he returned to the land of his youth, and drove almost 14,000 miles in search of a mythical small town called Amalgam, the kind of trim and sunny place where the films of his youth were set. Instead, his search led him to Anywhere, USA; a lookalike strip of gas stations, motels and hamburger outlets populated by lookalike people with a penchant for synthetic fibres. He discovered a continent that was doubly lost; lost to itself because blighted by greed, pollution, mobile homes and television; lost to him because he had become a stranger in his own land. Bryson's acclaimed first success, The Lost Continent is a classic of travel literature - hilariously, stomach-achingly, funny, yet tinged with heartache - and the book that first staked Bill Bryson's claim as the most beloved writer of his generation.

In a ruined temple along the Nile, Anthony Sattin sees a woman praying to the gods of ancient Egypt to bless her with a child. Later that day, a policeman stops his taxi to ask to borrow a mobile phone to call his mother. The ancient rubs up against the modern just as dramatically as when Flaubert wrote, 'Egypt is a wonderful place for contrasts - splendid things gleam in the dust". Anthony Sattin has tracked down extraordinary examples of ancient survivals in the hurly-burly of modern Egypt.

While much of the Middle East is now engulfed in conflict and repression, Morocco remains a curious anomaly: peaceful and open to the West, it has provided refuge for artists and writers for generations, and it remains an exotic destination for many curious travelers. The country has been influenced by an incredible variety of peoples Phoenicians, Romans, Arabs, Berbers, Muslims, Jews, and most of Europe s colonizers have played a role and modern Moroccan society is no less rich and varied. In "Morocco," Walter M. Weiss brings extensive knowledge of the region to bear as he travels the breadth and depth of the country s social and geographical contrasts. Berber villagers of the mountains are for the most part still illiterate and consider their king to be divinely chosen, while businessmen in Casablanca s towering offices dream of closer ties to the European Union. Weiss visits the settings of modern legends, such as Tangier, as well as the two medieval "centres Fes" and "Meknes," and sees earthen "kasbahs" and Marrakech s bazaar.On the way, he meets acrobats, Sufi musicians, pilgrims, craftsmen, beatniks, rabbis, and Berber farmers a kaleidoscope of variety and cultural influence. "

'An exhilarating story of freedom and constraint, told with a confident and unwavering verve. This is a journey driven by boundless curiosity, and by the desire for connection - across borders, across languages, across time' MALACHY TALLACK When Esa Aldegheri and her husband left their home in Orkney, Esa didn't know that their eighteen-month motorbike adventure would take them through twenty international frontiers - between Europe and the Middle East, through Pakistan, China and India - many of which are now impassable. Charting a story of shrinking and expanding liberties and horizons, of motherhood, womanhood, xenophobia and changing geopolitical situations, Free to Go examines the challenges of navigating a world where many assume that women ride pillion, both on a motorbike and within relationships. Part around-the-world adventure, part-literary exploration of womanhood, Free to Go is about the journeys that shape and transform us.

In 1966 Dervla Murphy travelled the length and breadth of Ethopia, first on a mule, Jock, whom she named after her publisher, and later on a recalcitrant donkey. The remarkable achievement was not surviving three armed robberies or the thousand-mile trail, but the gradual growth of affection for and understanding of another race.

The 50th anniversary deluxe edition of Travels with Charley in Search of America features an updated introduction by Jay Parini and first edition cover art and illustrated maps of Steinbeck's route by Don Freeman.
In September 1960, John Steinbeck embarked on a journey across America. He felt that he might have lost touch with the country, with its speech, the smell of its grass and trees, its color and quality of light, the pulse of its people. To reassure himself, he set out on a voyage of rediscovery of the American identity, accompanied by a distinguished French poodle named Charley; and riding in a three-quarter-ton pickup truck named Rocinante.
His course took him through almost forty states: northward from Long Island to Maine; through the Midwest to Chicago; onward by way of Minnesota, North Dakota, Montana (with which he fell in love), and Idaho to Seattle, south to San Francisco and his birthplace, Salinas; eastward through the Mojave, New Mexico, Arizona, to the vast hospitality of Texas, to New Orleans and a shocking drama of desegregation; finally, on the last leg, through Alabama, Virginia, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey to New York.
Travels with Charley in Search of America is an intimate look at one of America's most beloved writers in the later years of his life--a self-portrait of a man who never wrote an explicit autobiography. Written during a time of upheaval and racial tension in the South--which Steinbeck witnessed firsthand--Travels with Charley is a stunning evocation of America on the eve of a tumultuous decade.

In June 1863 an English lady set off by train on the trip of a lifetime: Thomas Cook's first Conducted Tour of Switzerland. A century and a half later, travel writer Diccon Bewes, author of the bestselling Swiss Watching, decided to go where she went and see what she saw. Guided by her diary, he followed the same route to discover how much had changed and how much hadn't. She went in search of adventure, he went in search of her, and found far more than he expected. Slow Train to Switzerland is the captivating account of two trips through the Alps: hers glimpsing the future of travel, his revisiting its past. Together they make a journey to remember. This is a tale of trains and tourists, of the British and the Swiss, of a Victorian traveller and a modern-day Englishman abroad. It is the story of a tour that changed both Switzerland and the world of travel forever.

Shortlisted for the Stanford Dolman Travel Book of the Year 2020 'A thought-provoking treatise interwoven with blistered-feet-on-the-ground accounts of spots both pretty and gritty' National Geographic 'Compelling, thought-provoking, and courageous, this epic-poetic journey peels back layers of collective emotional and imaginative inheritance. Jubber gets under the skin of our complicated continent and his timing is dead right' Kapka Kassabova 'A genuine epic' Wanderlust 'The prose is colourful and vigorous...Jubber's journeying has indeed been epic, in scale and ambition. In this thoughtful travelogue he has woven together colourful ancient and modern threads into a European tapestry that combines the sombre and the sparkling' Spectator 'Epic Continent sets out on a physical and mythological journey to uncover what it means to be European' Geographical These are the stories that made Europe. Reaching back into the ancient and medieval eras in which these defining works were produced, and investigating their continuing influence today, Epic Continent explores how matters of honour, fundamentalism, fate, nationhood, sex, class and politics have preoccupied the people of Europe across the millennia. In these tales soaked in blood and fire, Nicholas Jubber discovers how the world of gods and emperors, dragons and water maidens, knights and princesses made our own: their deep impact on European identity, and their resonance in our turbulent times. Journeying from Turkey to Iceland, award-winning travel writer Nicholas Jubber takes us on a fascinating adventure through our continent's most enduring epic poems to learn how they were shaped by their times, and how they have since shaped us.

Patrick Leigh Fermor was only 18 when he set off to walk from the Hook of Holland to Constantinople, described many years later in A Time of Gifts and Between the Woods and the Water. It was during these early wanderings that he started to pick up languages, and where he developed his extraordinary sense of the continuity of history: a quality that deepens the colours of every place he writes about, from the peaks of the Pyrenees to the cell of a Trappist monastery. His experiences in wartime Crete sealed the deep affection he had already developed for Greece, a country whose character and customs he celebrates in two books, Mani and Roumeli, and where he has lived for over forty years. Whether he is drawing portraits in Vienna or sketching Byron's slippers in Missolonghi, the Leigh Fermor touch is unmistakable. Its infectious enthusiasm is driven by an insatiable curiosity and an omnivorous mind - all inspired by a passion for words and language that makes him one of the greatest prose writers of his generation.

Make memories in this stunning travel journal, the perfect keepsake companion for your travels.

This gorgeous A5 journal is neatly organized into ten trips with space to plan for and reminisce about each - whether you're embarking on a far-flung adventure or enjoying a weekend away closer to home.

Helpful packing lists, budget trackers and accommodation notes are just the ticket for organizing each trip, while imperial and metric conversions and an envelope for storing receipts and postcards will come in handy when arriving in a new destination. There's even a ribbon bookmark and elastic close, so you can rest easy knowing your memories will be kept safe and secure.

Each trip includes both lined and blank pages for penning reflections or doodling while you're away so, whether you're documenting a city break or scribbling down memories from multiple destinations, there is plenty of space to let your creativity run free.

Need a little inspiration? There are also fun prompts, such as favourite meals and conversations, to help remember your travels - perfect for bringing each trip back to life when leafing through your journal in years to come.

**LONGLISTED FOR THE POLARI FIRST BOOK PRIZE** 'You've never read a travel memoir like this before' The Sunday Times, 'Pride Culture Guide' 'Sweet and fun, with real emotional depth and a rousing, feisty spirit' Matt Cain *** In the spring of 2012, Calum finds himself single again after his relationship of six years comes to an end. Heartbroken, unhappy and unsure of what to do next, he leaves the hometown he has been in all his life to embark on a journey that takes him all around the world, from teaching in a school on the outskirts of Rome to exploring the sex clubs of Berlin, to raising tigers in an animal sanctuary deep in the jungles of Thailand. Along the way, he meets LGBT+ people from all walks of life and every part of the rainbow - from an Italian teenager struggling with a homophobic father to a kathoey navigating life as a trans person in Thailand, to a young HIV-positive man living on the streets of London. Their individual stories, not only of hardship and sorrow but also of profound strength and hope, show the breadth and depth of queer life and experience, shedding light on themes such as homophobia, sexual violence, marriage equality and gender identity. Through these meetings and friendships, Calum not only finds the encouragement to embrace life after heartbreak, but also discovers a beautiful, loving global community who support and uplift him through the best and worst moments of his time on the road. A travel memoir with a difference, Eat, Gay, Love is a celebration of the power of community and a personal tribute to the extraordinary lives of LGBT+ people everywhere in the world.

MEXICO CITY, with some 20 million inhabitants, is the largest city in the Western Hemisphere. Enormous growth, raging crime, and tumultuous politics have also made it one of the most feared and misunderstood. Yet in the past decade, the city has become a hot spot for international business, fashion, and art, and a magnet for thrill-seeking expats from around the world.
In 2002, Daniel Hernandez traveled to Mexico City, searching for his cultural roots. He encountered a city both chaotic and intoxicating, both underdeveloped and hypermodern. In 2007, after quitting a job, he moved back. With vivid, intimate storytelling, Hernandez visits slums populated by ex-punks; glittering, drug-fueled fashion parties; and pseudo-native rituals catering to new-age Mexicans. He takes readers into the world of youth subcultures, in a city where punk and emo stand for a whole way of life--and sometimes lead to rumbles on the streets.
Surrounded by volcanoes, earthquake-prone, and shrouded in smog, the city that Hernandez lovingly chronicles is a place of astounding manifestations of danger, desire, humor, and beauty, a surreal landscape of "cosmic violence." For those who care about one of the most electrifying cities on the planet, ""Down & Delirious in Mexico City "is essential reading" (David Lida, author of "First Stop in the New World").

The British Isles are an archipelago made up of two large islands and 6,289 smaller ones. Some, like the Isle of Man, resemble miniature nations, with their own language and tax laws; others, like Ray Island in Essex, are abandoned and mysterious places haunted by myths, ghosts and foxes. There are resurgent islands such as Eigg, which have been liberated from capricious owners to be run by their residents; holy islands like Bardsey, the resting place of 20,000 saints, and still a site of spiritual questing; and deserted islands such as St Kilda, famed for the evacuation of its human population, and now dominated by wild sheep and seabirds. In this evocative and vividly observed book, Patrick Barkham explores some of the most beautiful landscapes in the British Isles as he travels to ever-smaller islands in search of their special magic. Our small islands are both places of freedom and imprisonment, party destinations and oases of peace, strangely suburban and deeply wild. They are places where the past is unusually present, but they can also offer a vision of an alternative future. Meeting all kinds of islanders, from nuns to puffins, from local legends to rare subspecies of vole, he seeks to discover what it is like to live on a small island, and what it means to be an islander.

More than half a century after his death, Winston Churchill, the most significant British statesman of the twentieth century, continues to intrigue us. Peter Clark's book, however, is not merely another Churchill biography. Churchill's Britain takes us on a geographical journey through Churchill's life, leading us in Churchill's footsteps through locations in Britain and Ireland that are tied to key aspects of his biography. Some are familiar-Blenheim Palace, where he was born; Chartwell, his beloved house in the country; and the Cabinet War Rooms, where he planned the campaigns of World War II. But we also are taken to his schools, his parliamentary constituencies, locations of famous speeches, the place where he started to paint, the tobacco shop where he bought his cigars, and the graves of his family and close friends. Clark brings us close to the statesman Churchill by visiting sites that were important to the story of his long life, from the site where his father proposed to his American mother on the Isle of Wight to his grave in a country churchyard in Oxfordshire. Designed as a gazetteer with helpful regional maps, Churchill's Britain can be dipped into, consulted by the traveler on a Churchill tour of Britain, or read straight through--and no matter how it's read, it will deliver fresh insights into this extraordinary man.

The Guide to the World's Most Iconic Road Known as America's Main Street, or the Mother Road, Historic Route 66 is more than just a road, it is the artery that connects America's heart with its head, a road-worthy metaphor of the nation's post-war rebirth of innovation and industrialism along the way, as well as a representation of freedom (and loss) for many of the nation's peoples. Route 66 is the place to get your kicks, don't forget too. A stretch of road with so many stunning stories and secrets to share and roadside attractions, and billboards, to see, all of which were built along its path to glory through its hundred-year tenure, a past that is now celebrated as a pilgrimage for millions of drivers and dreamers, truckers and tourists, yearning to reconnect with the country's golden age. So, come and get your kicks with The Little Book of Route 66. Full of facts, stats, quotes and quips - the perfect driving companion for those long family road-trips. If the road is a metaphor for life, then Route 66 is the road. Buckle up, because this is going to be a road-trip of a lifetime... and a journey to remember. SAMPLE TEXT: For the first twelve years of its existence, only 800 of its 2,400 miles were paved. The rest were dust and dirt tracks making for very bumpy riding. The highway was not finished being laid with tarmac until 1938.

A little over ten years ago, Janine Marsh and her husband Mark gave up their city jobs in London to chase the good life in the countryside of northern France. Having overcome the obstacles of starting to renovate her dream home - an ancient, dilapidated barn - and fitting in with the peculiarities of her new neighbours, Janine is now the go-to expat in the area for those seeking to get to grips with a very different way of life. In the Seven Valleys, each season brings new challenges as well as new delights. Freezing weather in February threaten the lives of some of the four-legged locals; snow in March results in a broken arm, which in turn leads to an etiquette lesson at the local hospital; and a dramatic hailstorm in July destroys cars and houses, ultimately bringing the villagers closer together. With warmth and humour, Janine showcases a uniquely French outlook as two eternally ambitious expats drag a neglected farmhouse to life and stumble across the hidden gems of this very special part of the world ________________ Praise for Janine Marsh's My Good Life in France: 'Warm, uplifting, and effervescent ... Janine's voice and humor bubble right off the page, making you want to pack your bags and visit her fixer-upper home in rural France' - Samantha Verant, author of Seven Letters from Paris 'If you've ever dreamed of discovering "the real France", you won't want to miss this delightful book' - Keith Van Sickle, author of One Sip at a Time: Learning to Live in Provence

Over the last two and a half years, Chris Tarrant has travelled, literally, all around the world filming Extreme Railway Journeys for Channel 5. The hugely successful TV series is already being repeated, and broadcast rights have been, and continue to be, picked up in other countries, while it is also being released on DVD. Chris's journeys have taken him to the Congo, India, Australia, Bolivia (twice), Japan, Siberia, Myanmar, Canada and Cuba, and the latest programmes see the completion of filming in Alaska, Argentina, Azerbaijan, South Africa and Zimbabwe. Chris Tarrant's Extreme Railway Journeys brings to life beautifully not only the romance of travelling by train, but also the sights, sounds and smells of the countries and places visited, while also illuminating the customs and attitudes of the people the author encountered along the way. But, as he says, 'I should have known what I was in for and what the word "extreme" means, when the very first show saw us filming in the Congo - where the train was six DAYS late.' Beautifully illustrated with exclusive colour photographs, Extreme Railway Journeys is not only a record of remarkable journeys in extraordinary places by one of our shrewdest commentators. It is also a demonstration of the principle that 'to travel hopefully is a better thing than to arrive'.