Marilyn

SeaUrchin, this category of books, travel adventure, is one of my favorites, and I have a huge collection of titles. I will have to do a little research to pull a list together, but I can offer you some FABULOUS reads.

Just for starters:
*Running the Amazon by Joe Kane
(you won't be able to put it down)
*Shooting the Boh by Tracy Johnston
*Holidays in Hell by PJ O'Rourke
(politically incorrect, but oh so funny)

Let me know if you want more.

Redmond O'Hanlon has written a book about Borneo also.

SeaUrchin

Yes, Marilyn, more please. Thanks.

I should give a nod to my maternal grandmother too, she came out west by herself in the 1880's from Illinois, became a school 'marm in a wild west cowboy town and had some tales of her own. Of course, she would never have thought of herself as an adventurer or stodgy, she just took risks.

rj007

SeaUrchin

Stranger in the Forest and Motoring with Mohammed were written by Eric Hanson, not Redmond O'Hanlon. Both are excellent books and O'Hanlon is a good writer. More good travel writers I like include Tony Horwitz, Pico Iyer, Tim Cahill, V.S. Naipaul, Christina Dodwell and Sara Wheeler.

annesherrod

Marilyn,
Thanks for the list of books. DH and I spend a lot of time and ehhh....$ at the Book store, and I just finished my book.
I think I will pick one up tonight. Any other suggestions if you think of them would be great!!!!
Anne

Marilyn

Anne, I am an omnivorous and eclectic reader, so tell me what you like. Years ago I started writing down the name and author of every book I read, so I have a reference to help me recall titles.

sognatrice2

After checking out Peter Moore's website, I see that his journey didn't involve just any ordinary Vespa, but a vintage Vespa from the 60's, and therein lies the very heart of an interesting adventure recalling the great days of La Dolce Vita! Great story!

Marilyn

I'm a fan of Tim Cahill and would recommend anything he has written. Many of his books are essays and not strictly travel books, but they're wonderfully entertaining.

I love Pico Iyer, too, and have read most of his books.

OK, here are a few more you probably haven't heard of:
Who Goes Out in the Midday Sun? by Benedict Allen. (probably out of print, but what a story! He walks overland from the mouth of the Orinoco to the mouth of the Amazon.)

The Serpent and The Rainbow by Wade Davis (ethnobotanist goes to Haiti in search of info on voodoo and zombies. NOT horror or trash, but rather a fascinating read.)

And I love the anthologies of bad trips like "I Should Have Stayed Home."

twoflower

Old and stodgy at 40? I'm in my 60's and my wife and I backpack all over the shop. Occasionally we self-drive, but always independent of organised tours. I'm an avid travel reader and rate the writers mentioned above at various levels on a scale of OK to great, but the travellers/travel writers I most admire for independence and adventure, empathy with their surroundings and the local people (wherever they are), as well as for their excellent prose and story-telling ability, are William Dalrymple and Colin Thubron. (And if it's humour I'm looking for I go for Bill Bryson or Harry Pearson).

twoflower

...but then again, if you want to read about real adventure by people who are old enough to be excused for being stodgy (but they're not), you can't go past Dervla Murphy and Bettina Selby. It's not everyone who dares to trudge by mule across Ethiopia or puff on a pushbike all the way around Turkey!

SeaUrchin

rj007 thanks for the correction !

Sognatrice2, yes I should have written that part in my mini book report, that is what makes the book interesting. He is in search of La Dolce Vita ala Marcello M.!

twoflower, good for you!

And all of you thanks for the book recs, I am going to start buying them. But after you read good adventure books it makes agonizing over simple things when planning a trip sort of silly.

toni

Hey SeaUrchin, I am Australian and read that book. It was a hoot and indeed an inspiration. It reaffirmed for me the certain spirit of adventure that Australians have, no matter what age! Another good travel read by an Australian woman is "Almost French", an autobiography of a non-French person living in Paris, written with wit and wry observation. I am 50 this year, chronologically only, and still fit in little adventures everywhere I go. When I turned 40 I vowed to do something I had never done before every year. It's been great fun.

PatrickLondon

Redmond O'Hanlon has just published a book about a trip on an Atlantic fishing boat. I haven't read it, but most of the reviewers seem to agree that they'd prefer to stay on the stodgy side of that trip!

SeaUrchin

Patrick L and Toni, thanks for your tips . Toni, I vowed to do the same thing and once a year, hopefully on my birthday, I do something unusual, travel/mild adventure-wise.

Marilyn

twoflower, thanks for a couple of new authors to check on. Any particular books you recommend? I do love Bill Bryson, my favorite being In A Sunburned Country.

I read Dervla Murphy's account of bicycling through Romania, titled Transylvania and Beyond, and liked it a lot.

Has anyone else read Freya Starck, The Southern Gates of Arabia? Talk about adventurous...whew!

suze

I'm still wanting to answer the original posted questions (although I love all the book recommendations I was surprised to find on the thread).

At 50 I think my trips are more thrilling than when I was younger. I'm not sure why, maybe a certain confidence that comes with experience. And it doesn't hurt to have some pretty wild friends to go visit in foreign places.

Itallian_Chauffer

"THE BACK OF BEYOND" by James Charles Roy. An amusing story of an American author's experience as tour guide to the 'REAL' Ireland on a trip from Hell.

Good read.