United States Travel

Van Life is a lifestyle associated with freedom. With four wheels on the road at all times, you can go anywhere and do anything. If you’ve considered walking away from it all to join the legions of van dwellers, let us lend a helping hand. Everywhere on social media, you see breathtaking pictures of converted vans. These people who have launched themselves into van living with complete success. They seem to live the ultimate dream of freedom, rebellion, and careless, peaceful existence. Are you ready to join them?

In the best-selling tradition of Bill Bryson and Tony Horwitz, Rinker Buck's The Oregon Trail is a major work of participatory history: an epic account of traveling the entire 2,000-mile length of the Oregon Trail the old-fashioned way, in a covered wagon with a team of mules - which hasn't been done in a century - that also tells the rich history of the trail, the people who made the migration, and its significance to the country.

Hack your next Disney vacation to make the most magical place on earth the absolute happiest it can be with this updated guide to getting the most out of your visit.

"I never set out to hike 10,000 miles. It just sort of happened over the course of a decade." And so goes Lawton Grinter's compelling collection of short stories that have been over ten years and 10,000 trail miles in the making. I Hike brings the reader trailside with blissful moments on the highest mountain ridges to the mental lows of mosquito hell and into some peculiar situations that even seasoned hikers may find unbelievable.

Step into the rugged Rockies with Osborne Russell! Journey nine years through his trapper's journal, facing blizzards, bears, and bison while navigating life off the grid. Witness the clash of trappers and tribes, and glimpse the untamed beauty of a changing wilderness. This historical adventure unfolds in Russell's own words, offering a unique perspective on the early American West.

A collection of non-fiction essays about the counter-culture of the 1960s that dives deep into the issues that marked the era: female empowerment, increasing freedom around sexuality, vibrant subcultures, and the rise of psychedelic drugs. In this sprawling work, Wolfe profiles Playboy founder Hugh Hefner and compares him to Jay Gatsby, interviews one of the first women to get breast implants, and hangs out with freewheeling surfers (aka The Pump House Gang).

Many dream of dropping everything and just traveling around the world. It's a common dream, but few imagine embarking on that journey by bicycle. Exposed to the elements, legs burning, all your possessions strapped to you and your bicycle - it doesn't paint a relaxing picture, but this is just what Pierre-Yves Tremblay did.

On May 24, 1869 a one-armed Civil War veteran, John Wesley Powell, and a ragtag band of nine mountain men embarked on the last great quest in the American West. The Grand Canyon, not explored before, was as mysterious as Atlantis - and as perilous. The 10 men set out from Green River Station, Wyoming Territory, down the Colorado in four wooden rowboats. Ninety-nine days later, six half-starved wretches came ashore near Callville, Arizona.

A fantastic book! Timothy Egan describes his journeys in the Pacific Northwest through visits to salmon fisheries, redwood forests and the manicured English gardens of Vancouver. Here is a blend of history, anthropology and politics.

"With humor and lyrical grace," Kathleen Norris meditates on a place in the American landscape that is at once desolate and sublime, harsh, and forgiving, steeped in history and myth (San Francisco Chronicle). A combination of reporting and reflection, Dakota reminds us that wherever we go, we chart our own spiritual geography.

The Drive follows Teresa Bruce on her 2003 road trip through Mexico and onto the Pan-American Highway, in a rickety camper with her old dog and new husband in tow. Bruce first set off on the exact same route in 1973, her parents at the helm and their two young daughters in tow, as a reaction to the accidental death of their youngest child, Bruce's brother John John. Bruce is immensely talented in bringing scenery of Central and South America to life with her innate attention to detail and sense of storytelling.

For nearly a decade, Pulitzer Prize-winning critic Justin Davidson has explained the ever-changing city of New York to his readers at New York magazine, introducing new buildings, interviewing architects, tracking the way the transforming urban landscape shapes who New Yorkers are. Now, his extensive, inspiring knowledge will be available to a wide audience.

America's northern border is the world's longest international boundary, yet it remains obscure even to Americans. Travel writer Porter Fox spent two years exploring its length by canoe, freighter, and car - and in Northland, he delivers the little-known history of the region and a riveting account of his travels. Fox follows explorer Samuel de Champlain's adventures; recounts the rise and fall of the iron, wheat, and timber industries; crosses the Great Lakes on a freighter; and tracks America's fur traders through the Boundary Waters.

For years, America's national parks have provided public breathing spaces in a world in which such spaces are steadily disappearing, which is why close to 300 million people visit the parks each year. Now, to honor the centennial of the National Park Service, Terry Tempest Williams, the author of the beloved memoir When Women Were Birds, returns with The Hour of Land, a literary celebration of our national parks, what they mean to us, and what we mean to them.

Just before her 40th birthday, Gail Francis quit her perfectly good job and set out to hike one of the great trails of the world. Carrying everything she needed on her back, Francis spent five months walking from Mexico to Canada along the Pacific Crest Trail. Along the way, she lost her pack scrambling over scree in the desert, struggled to navigate high mountain passes, and wore the soles off her boots trekking across lava fields - all within some of the most pristine wilderness in the nation. Though she set out alone, her story includes an eclectic cast of characters.

This beautiful literary collection explores the spectacular natural features of Yosemite through the eyes of some of the most extraordinarily talented writers. In 1851, Lafayette Bunnell chronicled his travels with the Mariposa Battalion, the first non-natives to visit Yosemite Valley. Following in his footsteps, Theodore Roosevelt, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Mark Twain, Clarence King, Frederick Law Olmsted, Joaquin Miller, and Horace Greeley made their pilgrimages and were moved to recount their observations. Included here as well is the work of John Muir, founder of the Sierra Club.

Make story time a little spookier with the number one best-selling chapter book series of all time! Every visit to the magic tree house leads to a time-travel adventure! Jack and Annie are on a mission to find - and inspire - a musician that brings happiness to millions of people. After traveling to New Orleans, Jack and Annie come head to head with some real ghosts, and discover the world of jazz when they meet a young Louis Armstrong.

In recent years, Billy Connolly has had more than his share of challenges - in 2013 he was diagnosed with prostate cancer (he's now been given the all clear); on the same day he was diagnosed with the early stages of Parkinson's disease. But being a determined 72-year-old, Billy won't let the illness put him off one more exploration of the country he knows and loves so well.

In this landmark work on the Anasazi tribes of the Southwest, naturalist Craig Childs dives head-on into the mysteries of this vanished people. The various tribes that made up the Anasazi people converged on Chaco Canyon (New Mexico) during the 11th century to create a civilization hailed as "the Las Vegas of its day", a flourishing cultural center that attracted pilgrims from far and wide, and a vital crossroads of the prehistoric world. By the 13th century, however, Chaco's vibrant community had disappeared without a trace.

At 23, Andrew Forsthoefel headed out the back door of his home in Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania, with a backpack, an audio recorder, his copies of Whitman and Rilke, and a sign that read "Walking to Listen". He had just graduated from Middlebury College and was ready to begin his adult life, but he didn't know how. So he decided to take a cross-country quest for guidance, one where everyone he met would be his guide. In the year that followed, he faced an Appalachian winter and a Mojave summer. He met beasts inside: fear, loneliness, doubt.