There are no foreign lands. It is the traveler only who is foreign
List by Barbara
Quote by Robert Louis Stevenson
Bill Bryson's African diary
by Bill Bryson
916.762 BRY
Bill Bryson goes to Kenya at the invitation of CARE International, a charity which works with local communities to eradicate poverty around the world. Travelling around the country, Bryson casts his eye on a continent new to him, and writes a diary with wry observation and curious insight.
Ghost train to the Eastern star : on the tracks of the great railway bazaar
by Paul Theroux
915 THE
Thirty years after the epic journey chronicled in his classic work The Great Railway Bazaar, Paul Theroux re-creates his 25,000-mile journey through eastern Europe, central Asia, the Indian subcontinent, China, Japan, and Siberia. In the three decades since his original journey, the world he recorded in that book has undergone phenomenal change. The Soviet Union has collapsed and China has risen; India booms while Burma smothers under dictatorship; Vietnam flourishes in the aftermath of the havoc America was unleashing on it the last time Theroux passed through. Theroux's odyssey takes him from eastern Europe, still hung-over from communism, through tense but thriving Turkey into the Caucasus, where Georgia limps back toward feudalism while its neighbour Azerbaijan revels in oil-fueled capitalism. Theroux travels as the locals do - by stifling train, rattletrap bus, illicit taxi, and mud-caked foot - encountering adventures only he could have: from the literary (sparring with the incisive Nobel laureate Orhan Pamuk) to the dissolute (surviving a week-long bender on the Trans-Siberian Railroad).
Golden bats and pink pigeons
by Gerald Durrell
591.96982 DUR
"Mauritius was once the home of the ill-fated dodo. The indigenous flora and fauna of Mauritius were, by the 1970s, hanging onto their existence by their fingernails. When Gerald Durrell went to rescue some of these creatures from extinction, he experienced danger and discomfort, but enjoyed the adventures greatly." -- Publisher's description.
Provence A-Z
by Peter Mayle
914.49 MAY
An indispensable, richly informative, and always entertaining sourcebook on Provence by the writer who has made the region his own. Though organized from A to Z, this is hardly a conventional work of reference. It is rather a selection of those aspects of Provence that Peter Mayle in almost twenty years there has found to be the most interesting, curious, delicious, or down-right fun. In more than 170 entries he writes about subjects as wide-ranging as architecture and zingue-zingue-zoun (in the local patois, a word meant to describe the sound of a violin), as diverse as expatriates, Aix-en-Provence, the Provençal character, legends, lavender, linguistic oddities, the museum of the French Foreign Legion, the museum of the corkscrew, the origins of “La Marseillaise,” and a bawdy folklore character named Fanny. And, of course, he writes about food and drink: vin rose;, truffles, olives, melons, bouillabaisse, the cheese that killed a Roman emperor, even a cure for indigestion. The wonderful accompanying artwork includes curiosities Mayle has gathered over the years - matchbooks, drawings, century-old ads, photos, tourist brochures, maps. Provence A-Z is a delight for Peter Mayle’s ever-growing audience and the perfect complement to any guidebook on Provence, or, for that matter, France. -- Publisher description.
Long way round : chasing shadows across the world
by Ewan McGregor and Charley Boorman with Robert Uhlig
910.41 MAC
In this highly entertaining book, fellow film actors and bike enthusiasts Ewan McGregor and Charley Boorman travel 20,000 miles around the world by motorbike. They will encounter many troublesome situations on the way, ranging from extreme and threatening weather to impenetrable terrain, and will face challenges such as caviar fishing in the Caspian sea, wrestling with the Mongolian Olympic team and riding with the Canadian Mounties. Whilst throwing themselves enthusiastically into the culture of each new country - from Alaska to Mongolia, from Canada to Kazakhstan - the two friends will also have to rely on each other's good humour, as the journey tests their relationship and their stamina to the limits. Long Way Round is the action-packed account of the trip and a true portrait of friendship in extremis - as irreverent, engaging and articulate as Ewan McGregor and Charley Boorman themselves. -- Publisher description.
Note: if you've read this fantastic book then why not try the DVD series: Long way round [DVD videorecording] : complete TV series / Ewan McGregor & Charley Boorman. Please note we also have the next book - Long way down - where McGregor and Boorman ride from John O'Groats right down to South Africa. We also hold the DVD series chronicling this fantastic journey: Long way down [DVD videorecording] : the complete TV series. These DVDs are nonfiction and therefore may be borrowed free of charge.
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