Travel Writing Memoirs

Feeling stuck in his work and home life, writer Jeff Gordinier happened into a fateful meeting with Danish chef René Redzepi, whose restaurant, Noma, has been called the best in the world. A restless perfectionist, Redzepi was at the top of his game but was looking to tear it all down, to shutter his restaurant and set out for new places, flavors, and recipes. This is the story of the subsequent four years of globe-trotting culinary adventure, with Gordinier joining Redzepi as his Sancho Panza.

Out of the heart of China into the mountains of Central Asia, across Northern Afghanistan and the plains of Iran into Kurdish Turkey, Colin Thubron undertakes a journey along the greatest land route on earth: the Silk Road. Travelling 7,000 miles in eight months, he traces the passage not only of trade and armies, but of ideas, religions and inventions.

Michael Palin journeys to a vast country of unimaginable contrasts - Brazil. An economic powerhouse, it is host to a staggering variety of peoples. He starts his journey in the north, in the remote mountains and forests on the border with Venezuela, and finishes in the south at the legendary Iguaçu Falls. He travels by river-boat, float-plane and foot to visit tribes deep in the jungle, samples life in the agricultural and mining heartland of Brazil, experiences the modernism of Brasília and the heady mix of Rio de Janeiro, and ventures into the favelas.

An exemplary travelogue of danger and achievement by the Frenchwoman Madame Alexandra David-Neel of her 1923 expedition to Tibet, the fifth in her series of Asian travels and her personal recounting of her journey to Lhasa, Tibet's forbidden city. In order to penetrate Tibet and reach Lhasa, she used her fluency of Tibetan dialects and culture, disguised herself as a beggar with yak hair extensions and inked skin, and tackled some of the roughest terrain and climate in the world.

Paris. The name alone conjures images of chestnut-lined boulevards, sidewalk cafés, breathtaking façades around every corner: in short, an exquisite romanticism that has captured the American imagination for as long as there have been Americans.

In the summer of 1978, 21-year-old Paul Wilson jumps at the chance to join two local icons on a dream surf trip to mainland Mexico, unaware their ultimate destination lies in the heart of the drug cartel country. Having no earthly idea of where he’ll get the money to pay his share and determined to prove his mettle, he does the only thing he can think of: He robs a supermarket.

Steinbeck and Capa's account of their journey through Cold War Russia is a classic piece of reportage and travel writing.Just after the Iron Curtain fell on Eastern Europe, Pulitzer Prize-winning author John Steinbeck and acclaimed war photographer Robert Capa ventured into the Soviet Union to report for the New York Herald Tribune.

Narrated by the author, this is the tell-all tale of hunting with the same crossbow for a decade. Detailed exploits of Bunjie the crossbow and lessons learned by the hunter who carried him make this book an enjoyable and informative listening experience. You will be a better hunter if you listen to the author read this book! Well, at least you will be a happier one.

Best-selling and beloved author Frances Mayes discovers the hidden pleasures of Italy in a sumptuous travel narrative that crisscrosses the country, with inventive new recipes celebrating Italian cuisine.

Es ist ein sonniger Junimorgen, als Hape Kerkeling, bekennende "couch potato", endgültig seinen inneren Schweinehund besiegt und in Saint-Jean-Pied-de-Port aufbricht. Sechs Wochen liegen vor ihm, allein mit sich und seinem elf Kilo schweren Rucksack: über die schneebedeckten Gipfel der Pyrenäen, durch das Baskenland, Navarra und Rioja bis nach Galicien zum Grab des heiligen Jakob, seit über 1000 Jahren Ziel für Gläubige aus der ganzen Welt.

In 1934, the painter Christiane Ritter leaves her comfortable life in Austria and travels to the remote Arctic island of Spitsbergen, to spend a year there with her husband. She thinks it will be a relaxing trip, a chance to "read thick books in the remote quiet and, not least, sleep to my heart's content," but when Christiane arrives she is shocked to realize that they are to live in a tiny ramshackle hut on the shores of a lonely fjord, hundreds of miles from the nearest settlement, battling the elements every day, just to survive.

In their new book, Shayla Lawson reveals how traveling can itself be a political act, when it can be a dangerous world to be Black, femme, nonbinary, and disabled. With their signature prose, at turns bold, muscular, and luminous, Shayla Lawson travels the world to explore deeper meanings held within love, time, and the self.

Nicolas Vanier lâche son attelage. Devant lui, un défi immense : la Yukon Quest, la course de traîneaux à chiens la plus difficile au monde. 1600 kilomètres entre le Canada et l'Alaska, le long de la route de la ruée vers l'or. Des températures glaciales qui dépassent les - 50 degrés. Des vents qui vous renversent au premier relâchement. Un parcours accidenté exténuant.

Though Frances Mayes is known for her travels, she has always sought a sense of home wherever she goes. In this poetic testament to the power of place in our lives, Mayes reflects on the idea of home, from the earliest imprint of four walls to the startling discoveries of feeling the strange ease of homes abroad, friends’ homes, and even momentary homes that spark desires for other lives. From her travels across Italy to the American South, France, and Mexico, Mayes examines the connective tissue among them through the homes she’s inhabited.

In Ruth Reichl’s latest book—one that will delight her fans and convert those as yet uninitiated to her charming tales—the author brings to life her adventures in pursuit of good meals and good company. Picking up where Tender at the Bone leaves off, Comfort Me with Apples recounts Reichl’s transformation from chef to food writer, a process that led her through restaurants from Bangkok to Paris to Los Angeles and brought lessons in life, love, and food.

Delicious staples of a great meal, bread, cheese, and wine develop their complex flavors through a process known as fermentation. Katie Quinn spent months as an apprentice with some of Europe’s most acclaimed experts to study the art and science of fermentation. Visiting grain fields, vineyards, and dairies, Katie brings the stories and science of these foods to the table, explains the process of each craft, and introduces the people behind them.

This is a book about ten women over the past three hundred years who have found walking essential to their sense of themselves, as people and as writers. Wanderers traces their footsteps, from eighteenth-century parson's daughter Elizabeth Carter—who desired nothing more than to be taken for a vagabond in the wilds of southern England—to modern walker-writers such as Nan Shepherd and Cheryl Strayed.

Annette Joseph's years in Italy revealed this truth: Italy, in all its multifaceted, glorious history and culture has to be experienced in full. Over almost three decades, Italy has fed, entertained, confused, excited, lured, promised, lied, satisfied, occasionally disappointed, and utterly enchanted her. She's left, but can't stay away - she'll always return. Always. Just like a beloved partner....

Rosie Schaap had a solid career as a journalist and a life that looked to others like nonstop fun: all drinking and dining and traveling to beautiful places—and getting paid to write about it. But under the surface she was reeling from the loss of her husband and her mother—who died just one year apart. Caring for them had claimed much of her daily life in her late thirties. Mourning them would take longer. It wasn’t until a reporting trip took her to the Northern Irish countryside that Rosie found a partner to heal with: Glenarm, a quiet seaside village in County Antrim.

Du Fu (712-70) is one of China’s greatest poets. His career coincided with periods of famine, war and huge upheaval, yet his secular philosophical vision, combined with his empathy for the common folk of his nation, ensured that he soon became revered. Like Shakespeare or Dante, his poetry resonates in a timeless manner that ensures it is always relevant and offers something new to the modern generation. Broadcaster and historian Michael Wood follows in his footsteps to try to understand the places that inspired Du Fu to write some of the most famous and best-loved poetry the world has known.