Tourism History

Peter Mayle and his wife had been to Provence as tourists. They had dreamed of one day trading the long, grey winters and damp summers of England for the blue skies and sunshine of the coast of southern France. And then they made it happen. They moved into an old farmhouse at the foot of the Luberon mountains and embarked on a wonderful, if at times bewildering, new life.

Colour unlocks the history of the colours of the rainbow, and reveals how paints came to be invented, discovered, traded and used. This remarkable and beautifully written book, part travelogue part narrative history, remembers a time when red paint was really the colour of blood, when orange was the poison pigment, blue as expensive as gold and yellow made from the urine of cows force-fed with mangoes. It looks at how green was carried by yaks along the silk road, and how an entire nation was founded on the colour purple.

Vilhjálmur Stefánsson left New York in April 1908 to begin his journey northwards and into the Arctic Circle. For the next two years, he made his way northwards to Victoria Island to study an isolated group of Inuit who still used primitive tools and had strong Caucasian features, and whom some believed were descended from Vikings. The journey into these remote areas was incredibly tough and being delayed by blizzards Stefánsson, along with his companions, were forced to eat the tongue of a beached whale that had been dead for at least four years.

Over thousands of years, the Mississippi watershed was home to millions of Indigenous people who regarded "the great river" with awe and respect, adorning its banks with astonishing spiritual earthworks. But European settlers and American pioneers had a different vision: the river was a foe to conquer. In this landmark work of natural history, Boyce Upholt tells the epic story of human attempts to own and contain the Mississippi River, from Thomas Jefferson's expansionist land hunger through today's era of environmental concern

The Landscapes of Anne of Green Gables explores L. M. Montgomery's deep connection to the landscapes of Prince Edward Island that inspired her to write the beloved Anne of Green Gables series. From the Lake of Shining Waters and the Haunted Wood to Lover's Lane, you'll be immersed in the real places immortalized in the novels. Using Montgomery's journals, archives, and scrapbooks, Catherine Reid also explores the many similarities between Montgomery and her unforgettable heroine, Anne Shirley.

A little over 100 years ago, East Africa was terra incognita to most whites: a land largely unmapped, sparsely settled by Europeans, and teeming with wildlife. It was the hunter-adventurer's paradise, and by the early 20th century, a small, lionhearted clan of explorers and big-game hunters began leading safaris there for money.

His second major venture into nonfiction (after Death in the Afternoon, 1932), Green Hills of Africa is Ernest Hemingway's lyrical journal of a month on safari in the great game country of East Africa, where he and his wife, Pauline, journeyed in December of 1933. Hemingway's well-known interest in - and fascination with - big-game hunting is magnificently captured in this evocative account of his trip.

"Dr. Livingstone, I presume?" So goes the signature introduction of New York Herald star journalist Henry Morton Stanley to renowned explorer Dr. David Livingstone, who had been missing for six years in the wilds of Africa. Into Africa ushers us into the meeting of these remarkable men. In 1866, when Livingstone journeyed into the heart of the African continent in search of the Nile's source, the land was rough, unknown to Europeans, and inhabited by man-eating tribes.

Ten years after the walk across Central Asia and Afghanistan that he memorialized in The Places in Between, Rory Stewart set out on a new journey, traversing a thousand miles between England and Scotland. Stewart was raised along the border of the two countries, the frontier taking on poignant significance in his understanding of what it means to be both Scottish and English, of his relationship with his father, who's lived on this land his whole life, and of his ties to the rich history and culture of the region.

For fans of The Lost City of Z, Walking the Amazon, and Turn Right at Machu Picchu comes naturalist and explorer Paul Rosolie’s extraordinary adventure in the uncharted tributaries of the Western Amazon - a tale of discovery that vividly captures the awe, beauty, and isolation of this endangered land and presents an impassioned call to save it.

In the annals of seafaring and exploration, there is one name that immediately evokes visions of the open ocean, billowing sails, visiting strange, exotic lands previously uncharted, and civilizations never before encountered - Captain James Cook. Full of realistic action, lush descriptions of places and events, and fascinating historical characters such as King George III and the soon-to-be-notorious Master William Bligh, Dugard's gripping account of the life and death of Captain James Cook is a thrilling story of a discoverer hell-bent on going farther than any man.

From the National Book Award-winning writer, humanitarian, environmentalist and author of the now-classic Arctic Dreams: a vivid, poetic, capacious work that recollects the travels around the world and the encounters - human, animal, and natural - that have shaped his extraordinary life. Poignantly, powerfully, it also asks "How do we move forward?" Taking us nearly from pole to pole - from modern megacities to some of the most remote regions on the earth - Barry Lopez gives us his most far-ranging yet personal work to date.

A shimmering evocation, by turns intimate and panoramic, of one of the world’s great cities, by its foremost writer. Orhan Pamuk was born in Istanbul and still lives in the family apartment building where his mother first held him in her arms. His portrait of his city is thus also a self-portrait, refracted by memory and the melancholy—or hüzün—that all Istanbullus share.

Best-selling author Simon Winchester offers an enthralling biography of the Pacific Ocean and its role in the modern world, exploring our relationship with this imposing force of nature. Winchester's personal experience is vast and his storytelling second to none. And his historical understanding of the region is formidable, making Pacific a paean to this magnificent sea of beauty, myth, and imagination that is transforming our lives.

Marco Polo (1254-1324), is probably the most famous Westerner who traveled on the "Silk Road." His journey through Asia lasted 24 years. He traveled the whole of China and returned to tell the tale, which became one of the world's greatest travelogues.

Finding and identifying a pirate ship is the hardest thing to do under the sea. But two men—John Chatterton and John Mattera—are willing to risk everything to find the Golden Fleece, the ship of the infamous pirate Joseph Bannister. At large during the Golden Age of Piracy in the seventeenth century, Bannister should have been immortalized in the lore of the sea—his exploits more notorious than Blackbeard’s, more daring than Kidd’s. But his story, and his ship, have been lost to time.

A masterpiece of compelling narrative history, The White Ladder describes the epic rise of mountaineering's world altitude record, a story of ever higher climbs by figures great and small of mountaineering. Daniel Light describes how climbers used revolutionary techniques to launch themselves into the most forbidding conditions. The expeditions illustrate evolutionary changes in climbing style, the advancement of high-altitude science, and the development of mountain climbing as an industry.

Paris—city of love, food, culture—is steeped in a rich history known the world over. From the creative minds of Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec and Pierre-Auguste Renoir, who both frequented the world-famous Moulin Rouge at the turn of the twentieth century, to the many historic changes that saw Paris expand into the city of twenty arrondissements that residents and tourists flock to every year. In A Brief History of Paris, historian Cecil Black entertainingly details the stories behind the culture, locations, architecture, people, food and more that keeps visitors enchanted.

In The Geography of Genius, acclaimed travel writer Weiner sets out to examine the connection between our surroundings and our most innovative ideas. He explores the history of places, like Vienna of 1900, Renaissance Florence, ancient Athens, Song Dynasty Hangzhou, and Silicon Valley, to show how certain urban settings are conducive to ingenuity.

Journalist Michael Booth has lived among the Scandinavians for more than 10 years, and he has grown increasingly frustrated with the rose-tinted view of this part of the world offered up by the Western media. In this timely audiobook, he leaves his adopted home of Denmark and embarks on a journey through all five of the Nordic countries to discover who these curious tribes are, the secrets of their success, and, most intriguing of all, what they think of one another.