He journeyed farther than his near contemporary Marco Polo, though Muslim scholar Ibn Battuta (1304-c. 1377) is barely remembered at all compared to that legendary traveler. But Battuta's story is just as fascinating, as this 1829 translation of his diaries, by British Orientalist REV. SAMUEL LEE (1783 -1852), demonstrates. Embarking upon what would eventually be a 27-year pilgrimage, Battuta traveled through East Africa, the Middle East, India, China, and beyond, bringing him to most of the 14th-century Islamic world. Rife with beautiful descriptions of the exotic peoples he met and landscapes he saw, this little--known classic of medieval literature will enthrall scholars of Islamic history and armchair travelers alike.

Weighing the World is a revealing behind-the-scenes look at the scientific events leading to modern map making written by one of the world's master surveyors. Edwin Danson, using a similar approach to his earlier best seller, "Drawing the Line: How Mason and Dixon Surveyed the Most Important Border in America" (Wiley, 2000) takes us on a journey telling the story of this experiment that has not been written about in over two hundred years. National jealousies, commercial and political rivalry were the underlying causes for many of the eighteenth century's wars but war also provided the stimulus for much commercial effort and scientific innovation. Armies equipped with the latest weaponry marched about the countryside, led by generals with only the vaguest of maps at their disposal. At the start of the century there were no maps, anywhere in the world. While there were plenty of atlases and sketch maps of countries, regions and districts, with few exceptions they were imperfect renditions in nature. No one knew, with any certainty the shape of the earth or what lay beneath its surface. Was it hollow or was it solid? Were the Andes the highest mountain on the Earth or was it the peak of Tenerife? Was the Earth a perfect sphere or was it slightly squashed as Sir Isaac Newton prophesized? Just how did you accurately measure the planet? The answers to these and other questions about the nature of the Earth, answers we now take for granted, were complete mysteries. Danson presents the stories of the scientists and scholars that had to scale the Andes, cut through tropical forests and how they handled the hardships they faced in the attempt to revolutionize our understanding of the planet.

Now in paperback! A dual biography of two of the most compelling elements in the narrative of wild America, John Muir and Alaska. John Muir was a fascinating man who was many things: inventor, scientist, revolutionary, druid (a modern day Celtic priest), husband, son, father and friend, and a shining son of the Scottish Enlightenment -- both in temperament and intellect. Kim Heacox, author of The Only Kayak, bring us a story that evolves as Muir's life did, from one of outdoor adventure into one of ecological guardianship---Muir went from impassioned author to leading activist. The book is not just an engaging and dramatic profile of Muir, but an expose on glaciers, and their importance in the world today. Muir shows us how one person changed America, helped it embrace its wilderness, and in turn, gave us a better world. December 2014 marked the 100th anniversary of Muir's death. Muir died of a broken heart, some say, when Congress voted to approve the building of Hetch Hetchy Dam in Yosemite National Park. Perhaps in the greatest piece of environmental symbolism in the U.S. in a long time, on the California ballot last November was a measure to dismantle the Hetch Hetchy Dam. Muir's legacy is that he reordered our priorities and contributed to a new scientific revolution that was picked up a generation later by Aldo Leopold and Rachel Carson, and is championed today by influential writers like E.O. Wilson and Jared Diamond. Heacox takes us into how Muir changed our world, advanced the science of glaciology and popularized geology. How he got people out there. How he gave America a new vision of Alaska, and of itself.

As the research to this book proceeded there were major finds of papers previously unknown even to the David Livingstone Research Project in Edinburgh. This collection of David Livingstone's personal papers, edited by Timothy Holmes, is from the Livingstone Museum in Zambia and features many previously unpublished letters. The first part deals with his period in Botswana, the second part focuses on the Zambezi expedition (1858-64), the third section covers to time of his visit to Britain in 1864-5, and the fourth part covers his last journey (1866-73). North America: Indiana U Press; Zambia: UNZA Press

Covering the time period from 1807, when John Colter first discovered the wonders of the Yellowstone Plateau to the 1920s when tourists sped between luxury hotels in their automobiles, these tales of Wonderland come from the letters, journals, and diaries kept by early visitors and later tourists. The earliest stories recount mountain men's awe at geysers hurling boiling water hundreds of feet into the air and their encounters with the native inhabitants of the region. The latest stories reflect the "civilizing" of the park and reveal the golden age of tourist travel in the area.

An old truism holds that a scientific discovery has three stages: first, people deny it is true; then they deny it is important; finally, they credit the wrong person. Alfred Wegener's "discovery" of continental drift went through each stage with unusual drama. In 1915, when he published his theory that the world's continents had once come together in a single landmass before splitting apart and drifting to their current positions, the world's geologists denied and scorned it. The scientific establishment's rejection of continental drift and plate tectonic theory is a story told often and well. Yet, there is an untold side to Wegener's life: he and his famous father-in-law, Wladimir Koppen (a climatologist whose classification of climates is still in use), became fascinated with climates of the geologic past. In the early 20th century Wegener made four expeditions to the then-uncharted Greenland icecap to gather data about climate variations (Greenland ice-core sampling continues to this day). Ending in Ice is about Wegener's explorations of Greenland, blending the science of ice ages and Wegener's continental drift measurements with the story of Wegener's fatal expedition trying to bring desperately needed food and fuel to workers at the central Greenland ice station of Eismitte in 1930. Arctic exploration books with tragic endings have become all too common, but this book combines Wegener's fatal adventures in Greenland with the relevant science--now more important than ever as global climate change becomes movie-worthy ("The Day After Tomorrow").

An unabridged edition to include: Wherein I Bow to the Reader - A Prelude to the Quest - A Magician Out of Egypt - I Meet A Messiah - The Anchorite of the Adyar River - The Yoga Which Conquers Death - The Sage Who Never Speaks - With The Spiritual Head of South India - The Hill of the Holy Beacon - Among The Magicians And Holy Men - The Wonder-Worker of Benares - Written in the Stars - The Garden of the Lord - At the Parsee Messiah's Headquarters - A Strange Encounter - In a Jungle Hermitage - Tablets of Forgotten Truth

Fritz demonstrates how a series of unrelated events converged to make the Lewis and Clark expedition—and America's dream of westward expansion—a reality. Maps guide the reader along the routes taken by Lewis and Clark, and a detailed timeline gives readers an easy-to-use resource for looking up important dates and events. Biographical sketches of major figures conclude the work. An extensive bibliography and index make this an ideal first stop for anybody interested in learning more about this truly remarkable expedition. William Clark and Meriwether Lewis are widely credited with exploring the American West and paving the way for settlement. Yet if Thomas Jefferson's bid for president in 1800 had failed, the expedition probably would not have ventured west. Furthermore, if Napoleon had not been dealt a severe blow by a Haitian slave rebellion, France might never have sold the Louisiana Territory to the United States. The expedition also relied heavily on the goodwill of Native Americans peopling the explored territory. Fritz demonstrates how a series of unrelated events converged to make the Lewis and Clark expedition—and America's dream of westward expansion—a reality. Maps guide the reader along the routes taken by Lewis and Clark, and a detailed timeline gives readers an easy-to-use resource for looking up important dates and events. Biographical sketches of major figures conclude the work. An extensive bibliography and index make this an ideal first stop for anybody interested in learning more about this truly remarkable expedition.

La emigracion ilegal es un fenomeno que se ponde de manifiesto en la mayoria de los paises del tercer mundo. Como es conocido por todos, Cuba es uno de los paises desde donde salen cientos de emigrantes ilegales (llamados balseros) en busca del territorio estadounidense a traves de las peligrosas aguas del Estrecho de la Florida y a traves del extenso Mar Caribe.

En el intento de lograr sus objetivos, fundamentalmente economicos y de libertad, muchos logran coronar, pero tambien muchos desaparecen de manera lamentable en las profundidades de los mares.

En Escape al Caribe, su autor y protagonista en esta historia, es uno de los tantos cubanos que han utilizado el mar como via de escape. Aqui se narra la peligrosa travesia que el ralizo, conjuntamente con once de sus compatriotas, cruzando el Mar Caribe en una precaria embarcacion y luego atravesando los paises centroamericanos hasta llegar a Estados Unidos, enfrentandose de manera desafiante a infinidades de peligros que solamente se presentan en situaciones como esta."