Search Results for: travel writing

Martin Strel looks like your typical middle-aged bloke. He likes a laugh, a drink and the sight of a pretty woman. But put him in water and he turns into a swimming machine.
In April 2007, after 66 days, he became the first person to swim the Amazon, 3,274 miles from the Peruvian Andes to the Atlantic shores of Brazil. On this extraordinary journey he dodged piranhas, sharks and river pirates, met indigenous tribes who either revered him as a god or chased him with machetes, and swam from dawn to dusk for 60 miles every single day. Like pioneers before him who first climbed Everest or explored the poles, Martin shifted the limits of human capability.
His story – of endurance, of determination, of dehydration and exhaustion, of illness and blood pressure that reached heart-attack levels – is an inspiration to people everywhere.

There were five rules of Twitchhiker:
I can only accept offers of travel and accommodation from people on Twitter. I can’t make any travel plans further than three days in advance. I can only spend money on food, drink and anything that might fit in my suitcase. If there is more than one offer, I choose which I take. If there is only one, I have to take it within 48 hours. If I am unable to find a way to move on from a location within 48 hours, the challenge is over and I go home. Bored in the bread aisle of the supermarket one day, Paul Smith wondered how far he could get around the world in 30 days through the goodwill of users of social networking site Twitter. At the mercy of these rules, he set his sights on New Zealand – the opposite point on the planet to his home in Newcastle. All he had to do next was explain the idea to his new wife.
In an adventure wrapped in nonsense and cocooned in daft, he travelled by road, boat, plane and train, slept in five-star luxury and on no-star floors, shmoozed with Hollywood A-listers and was humbled by the generosity of the thousands who followed his journey and determined its course.
@twitchhiker I can send you to Wichita by Greyhound if that’s any good… Sent 10:13 AM Mar 12th
I was more or less in the exact geographical centre of a different continent, and a nameless woman some 4,000 miles east in Dublin was buying me a bus ticket…

Leaving the blinding sand for the cool shade of the trees, I walked carefully through the undergrowth to where Dave, using two twigs as chopsticks, was picking up a freshly severed human finger…

John’s trip to India starts badly when he finds himself looking at the sharp end of a knife in a train station cubicle. His life is saved by the enigmatic Rick, who persuades John to abandon his mundane plans for the future for much, much more. Fast forward to the Thai island of Koh Pha-Ngan where they pose as millionaire aristocrats in a hedonistic Eden of beautiful girls, free drugs and wild beach parties. Soon pursued by Thai Mafia, they escape to Indonesia, Australia and Hong Kong, facing danger at every turn.

Filled with wild adventures in exotic locations, this is not travel writing for the faint-hearted: this is an amazing true story of the hunt for excess at any cost.

It was an empty landscape now with huge horizons in every direction, a compressed, steam-rollered desert where man had no place. We lacked the skills to carry out even basic fixes. If the van stopped working we were really stuck. No one knew where we were and our last mobile phone signal had been 150 miles ago.

Fifty-something and tired of arguing with John Humphrys over the day’s headlines, BBC journalists Geoff and David found themselves eagerly volunteering for redundancy. But rather than easing into retirement with the odd round of golf, they decided to buy a van and drive off to Mongolia. Well, it seemed like a good idea at the time…

In an epic journey through Ukraine, Russia, Kazakhstan, Siberia and across the Gobi Desert, they discover more about each other in a few weeks than they did sharing an office for years.
Lying in wait are crooked cops, bent border guards and terrible roads, but also welcoming and curious locals, eager to help the pair on their mission.

It would have been churlish to have refused his invitation to accompany him on
a trip to ‘forage for hidden treasures’. If the truth be known, I secretly couldn’t resist the novelty of passing time with a bloke called Serge Bastarde.

When John decamps to France to start up as an antiques dealer, he doesn’t count on meeting Serge Bastarde. The lovable rogue and brocanteur offers to teach John the tricks of the trade in return for help in a series of unscrupulous schemes. As the pair trawl through markets and farmhouses, they con hearty lunches from old peasants and get into scrapes with priceless collectibles. Filled with eccentric characters and unlikely adventures, this is a hilarious romp through the real rural France.

… one of the best ways to get to know a country is to take yourself to the less touristy, less obvious destinations. And let’s face it: things don’t get much less touristy than Slough…

As staff travel writer on The Times since 1997, Tom Chesshyre had visited over 80 countries on assignment, and wondered: what is left to be discovered?

He realised that the answer might be very close to home. In a mad adventure that took him from Hull to Hell (actually a rather nice holiday location in the Isles of Scilly), Tom visited secret spots of Unsung Britain in search of the least likely holiday destinations. He got to know the real Coronation Street in Salford, explored Blade Runner Britain in Port Talbot, discovered that everything’s quite green in Milton Keynes, met real-life superheroes and many a suspicious landlady, and watched a football match with celebrity chef Delia Smith in Norwich.

With a light and edgy writing style Tom peels back the skin of the unfashionable underbelly of Britain, and embraces it all with the spirit of discovery.

Tips and Ideas for Making Your Gap Year Great
Gap years are bursting with possibility, begging to be filled with new experiences and unforgettable moments. But how do you make the most of your time out? This handy guide is packed with exciting and creative ideas that will take you all over the world. Whether you’re in search of a thrilling outdoor activity or a spiritual awakening, here’s how to make it truly memorable.

‘It seemed a terrible shame to meet my end in Iowa; I couldn’t imagine anywhere more disappointing to die. If I were a betting man I’d have reckoned on the most dangerous thing in this state being sheer boredom. The scenery hadn’t changed for weeks and I was slowly dissolving into stimulation-deprived madness. My current predicament, then – attempting to escape through cornfields from a gun-toting alcohol-soaked rancher – was not something I expected.’
Just months after graduating from university, Leon received disastrous news: he had been offered a job. Terrified at the prospect of a life spent behind a desk, without challenge or adventure, he took off to cross America on an overloaded bicycle packed with everything but common sense. Over five months and 6,000 miles, Leon cycled from New York to Seattle and then on to the Mexican border, facing tornadoes, swollen river crossings and one hungry black bear along the way. But he also met kind strangers who offered their food, wisdom, hospitality and even the occasional local history lesson, and learned what happens when you take a chance and follow the scent of adventure.

What would it feel like to be out there alone in that empty vastness? Just before midnight on 24 November 2011, Felicity is left completely alone on the coast of Antarctica. The isolation is instant and devastating. Only three people in the world have crossed Antarctica alone. The first two were men and both Norwegian. At the age of 34, British woman Felicity Aston became the third. Unlike her predecessors, she didn’t use kites or parasails to assist her. Within days, frozen into her facemask and reflecting on what had drawn her to such a place, she was battling desperate weather as she towed her heavy sledges. Every morning she wakes believing she cannot face another day as the expedition becomes a race against time to reach the coast before the last flight out. This gripping and inspirational account of personal endurance shows what you can achieve when you grit your teeth and decide just to get through today in one piece.

Stay wild and free

There’s a whole world out there just waiting to be explored. Spark your wanderlust with this little book, packed with beautiful quotes and affirmations from the world’s greatest travellers and adventurers, and be inspired to dream, explore and discover!

Tired of airport security queues, delays and all those extra taxes and charges, Tom Chesshyre embarks on a series of high-speed adventures across the Continent on its fast trains instead. From shiny London St Pancras, Tom travels to places that wouldn’t feature on a standard holiday wish-list, and discovers the hidden delights of mysterious Luxembourg, super-trendy Rotterdam, much-maligned Frankfurt and lovely lakeside Lausanne, via a pop concert in Lille. It’s 186 mph all the way – well, apart from a power cut in the Channel Tunnel on the way to Antwerp. Is our idea of ‘Europe’ changing as its destinations become easier to reach? And what fun can you have at the ends of the lines? Jump on board and find out!

A fun and inspiring interactive journal for boys aged 9-12

It’s time to be the best you can be and celebrate all your awesomeness!

Welcome to the time in your life when lots of big, exciting stuff happens! This companion is here to guide you along the way. It’s full of cool fill-in activities, quizzes to do with friends, tips for achieving your goals and dreams, and advice on how your body will change as you head into your teenage years. Helping you plan and prepare for big days, like starting a new school or taking an exam, and offering some great ideas when you need a confidence boost, this book covers the essentials and so much more!

All About Me is for you and you alone, so dive in and get started. Pick up a pen and make this journal as amazing and original as you are.

Write a letter to your future self – what would you say?
Create the ultimate travel bucket list and dream big.
How well do you and your best friend really know each other? Take the quiz to find out!

‘We-have-a-house-in-the-country?’
Lena nodded solemnly. 
‘Where?’ I almost shouted, briefly rattling the table. ‘No, wait, don’t tell me – it’s Todi in Umbria, right? The old manor house, the one with the lemon groves!’
‘Alt-Globnitz.’
‘Alt-Globnitz?’ Suddenly I felt cold.
‘Alt-Globnitz. It’s a really nice place. You will love it.’
In a desperate attempt to save his relationship with girlfriend Lena and take a break from the world of journalism, Germany correspondent Roger Boyes agrees to make a great escape from the easy urban lifestyle of Berlin and decamp to the countryside. Roger has hopes for southern Italy, but Lena has inherited a run-down old schloss in deepest, darkest Brandenburg.
Needing a form of income, they decide to set up a B & B with a British theme. Enter unhelpful Harry and his Trinidadian chef cousin, a mad Scot to advise them on re-branding Brandenburg, some suicidal frogs and a posse of mad tourists. It all culminates, naturally, in a cricket match between the Brits and the Germans on an old Russian minefield. Farce meets romance in this follow-up to the successful A Year in the Scheisse.

It’s time we celebrated women in adventure

What does “toughness” mean to you? Perhaps it’s being physically fit and mentally resilient. Perhaps it’s doing something no one else has done before. Perhaps it’s breaking down boundaries and proving what you can do, in spite of the naysayers. Perhaps it’s travelling alone, immersing yourself in new cultures and meeting new people. Perhaps it’s running ultramarathons in the blistering heat and beating the competition. Perhaps it’s conquering your fears.

The badass adventurers in this collection are all fearless, intelligent, compassionate and curious about the world – and they all happen to be female. From endurance obstacle races to arctic expeditions, from mountain climbing to wingsuit flying, from horse trekking to swimming the English Channel, they have set the bar high for what women are capable of. Let yourself be inspired by their stories of grit, courage, determination, triumph and heartbreak – you never know, it might lead to something incredible!

Sixteen years after first moving to Catalonia, Richard Guise finally finds time to slow down and explore the back roads by bicycle. With over 400 kilometres of sparkling Mediterranean shoreline and an interior dominated by the Pyrenees, it’s a spectacular journey from wind-blown headlands to the glitzy costas, and from bustling Barcelona to remote hillsides where only wild goats grazing and chirruping cicadas disturb the tranquillity.

Dipping into the unique history of this fiercely independent nation-within-a-nation, he uncovers many of its cultural peculiarities, such as why the sardana dance is not as easy as it looks and what to do in a bugaderia. Chancing upon nudist beaches, ancient Iberian sites and revolutionary road-sweepers, this slow cyclist revels in authentic Catalonia.

The Great North Road is Britain’s Route 66 – we’ve just forgotten how to sing its praises

In 1921, Britain’s most illustrious highway, the Great North Road, ceased to exist – on paper at least. Stretching from London to Edinburgh, the old road was largely replaced by the A1 as the era of the motor car took hold.

A hundred years later, journalist and cyclist Steve Silk embraces the anniversary as the perfect excuse to set off on an adventure across 11 days and 400 miles. Travelling by bike at a stately 14 miles per hour, he heads north, searching out milestones and memories, coaching inns and coffee shops.

Seen from a saddle rather than a car seat, the towns and the countryside of England and Scotland reveal traces of Britain’s remarkable past and glimpses of its future. Instead of the familiar service stations and tourist hotspots, Steve tracks down the forgotten treasures of this ancient highway between the two capitals.

The Great North Road is a journey as satisfying for the armchair traveller as the long-distance cyclist. Enriched with history, humour and insight, it’s a tribute to Britain and the endless appeal of the open road.

A leisurely ramble through the woods, a meandering city stroll, a blustery seaside promenade or a vigorous mountain hike – all have their delights and incomparable joys. Whatever your walking style, you’ll be captivated and enthralled by the stories and excerpts of classic writing, trivia and practical tips in this book – perfect for anyone who loves the freedom of lacing up their hiking boots and heading for the hills.    

If I’d really been serious about getting to grips with my mid-life crisis, then I’d have been better opting for a course of therapy than going off travelling. Or if I had to travel, I’d have been better opting for somewhere warm with a beach…

In an attempt to get to grips with a BIG birthday, Steve sets out from Oxford to explore what makes the English… well, so English. His quirky humour is inspired by Tom Rolt, who took to the canals on a similar journey immortalised in the book ‘Narrow Boat’, kick-starting the revival of Britain’s waterways. Prepare for a generous helping of mayhem, mishaps and the staple of every English summer: torrential rain. First published as ‘Fruit Flies Like a Banana’ this revised edition with new material is published to coincide with the 70-year anniversary of Tom Rolt’s own classic trip.

When Samantha Brick’s life started to unravel – her company in liquidation, homeless, penniless and friendless, and on max-strength anti-depressants – it seemed that everything was going wrong. But a chance week away in France led to the most unexpected of all turn-arounds: a whirlwind romance with gun-toting, stubborn and ever-so-macho Pascal. It wasn’t until she moved in to his cottage in the beautiful Lot region in south-west France that she realised how shamefully ill-equipped she was for the country life.

Like Cinderella in reverse, Samantha had to learn to cook, clean, chop wood and keep house, as well as discovering how to be a step-mum to Pascal’s know-it-all ten-year-old son, finding love and happiness along the way.

The woman was one of those irritating expat types who felt she owed it to the world to impart on her all her superior knowledge of life in France. I realised that if I didn’t stop her now, she’d be bending my ear all the way to Bergerac.

‘Actually,’ I said, leaning in toward the woman, ‘I’m planning to integrate my way into the boxers of the first good-looking Frenchman I see. Can’t think of any better way to learn the language myself. You wouldn’t happen to know the French for “fancy a shag?” would you? Voulez-vous coucher avec moi just seems a bit nineteen-seventies these days.’

After one particularly bad day at work, advertising executive and confirmed city girl Melanie Jones decides to give up her old life in search of something new and simpler in South West France. With little knowledge of the country, even less of the language and just the memory of a disastrous school French exchange and a few day trips to Calais, she embarks on her adventure with a suitcase full of optimism and not a little bit of naivety. After all, how different can life in France be?

After a series of adventures with skirt-ripping tractors, handsome twin farmers, celebrity not-quite-beens, unusual toilets and a bonkers ex-pat community, all topped up, of course, with lashings of rosé, Melanie begins to discover that her new life in France isn’t quite what she’d thought it would be.

A chance conversation with her greengrocer about the media’s portrayal of India inspired journalist Justine Hardy to leave London and, following in the footsteps of Rudyard Kipling, spend a year working at The Indian Express in New Delhi. Her new life – with a quirky landlord who turns out to be a former Rajput prince – takes her all over India from polo matches and Assam tea gardens to city slums.

Between soaring mountains, across arid deserts, parched plains and valleys of fruit orchards and olive groves, down glittering coastlines and along viaducts towering above plunging ravines… there is no better way to see Spain than by train.

Rail enthusiast Tom Chesshyre, author of Slow Trains to Venice, Ticket to Ride and Tales from the Fast Trains, hits the tracks once again to take in the country through carriage windows on a series of clattering rides beyond the popular image of “holiday Spain” (although he stops by in Benidorm and Torremolinos too).

From hidden spots in Catalonia, through the plains of Aragon and across the north coast to Santiago de Compostela, Chesshyre continues his journey via Madrid, the wilds of Extremadura, dusty mining towns, the cathedrals and palaces of Valencia and Granada, and finally to Seville, Andalusia’s beguiling (and hot) capital.

Encounters? Plenty. Mishaps? A lot. Happy Spanish days? All the way.

 heard the rustle again, too close and too real to ignore.  I clutched the flashlight, stuck my head out of the mosquito net… and found myself face-to-face with a jaguar.
Four travelers meet in Bolivia and set off into the heart of the Amazon rainforest to find a hidden tribe and explore places tourists only dream of seeing.  But what begins as the adventure of a lifetime quickly deteriorates into a dangerous nightmare. 
After weeks of wandering in the dense undergrowth the group splits up after disagreements, and Yossi and his friend try to find their own way back without a guide. When a terrible rafting accident separates him from his partner, Yossi is forced to survive for weeks alone against one of the wildest backdrops on the planet. Stranded without a knife, map, or survival training, he must improvise shelter and forage for wild fruit to survive. As his feet begin to rot during raging storms, as he loses all sense of direction, and as he begins to lose all hope, he wonders whether he will make it out of the jungle alive. 
The basis of an upcoming motion picture starring Daniel Radcliffe,”Lost in the Jungle”is the incredible story of friendship and the teachings of nature, survival and human fortitude and a terrifying true account that you won’t be able to put down.

‘At one moment you seem to be in the Lake District; then you could be on the moon; then you are in a wilderness; and then beside a Norwegian fjord.’ When Edward decided to cycle around Ireland, he was enchanted by prehistoric fortresses, rugged landscapes, and landladies who insisted on washing his shirts. He takes you with him on a gentle ride up the west coast, eating enormous breakfasts and fresh fish for supper along the way, and stopping to chat to peat-cutters, fishermen, eccentric tourists and a famous matchmaker. With his trademark dry wit, observant eye and a sense of the absurd, he is the perfect companion for a tour of Ireland’s most beautiful areas from the lakes of Killarney to the idyllic Joyce’s Country, and from the dolmens of Clare to the deserts and neolithic remains of Mayo.