Best adventure/exploration books (fact or fiction)?

[Gastropod]

Any recommendations for good exploration/adventure travel books? Fact or fiction.

Anywhere in the world, from the intrepid and dramatic to the humorous.

Have read and love Bill Bryson and Paul Theroux, and just finished reading about a couple of fascinating sailing voyages by Tim Severin.

Also loved Tim Butcher's Congo and Liberia books.

Now reading the Lost City of Z which I'm enjoying greatly.

Any other recommendations?

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Horse-Boy-Fathers-Miraculous-Journey/dp/0141033630

Read this ages ago. Really enjoyed it.

https://www.wob.com/en-gb/books/charles-wilkins/paddle-to-the-amazon-the-ultimate-12-000-mile-canoe-adventure/9780708842669?cq_src=google_ads&cq_cmp=18059580451&cq_con=&cq_med=pla&cq_plac=&cq_net=x&gclid=CjwKCAjw5_GmBhBIEiwA5QSMxL-AVJg1gE9zI3A4Jo-J4Az_bDcW5t6Ggh2yNVcUY0nrrZuwyyHiYRoCyPAQAvD_BwE#GOR001190130

Another travel book I read yonks ago and really enjoyed.

’West with Giraffes’ - fictional book about moving giraffes across America, loosely based on re as L life

’ American grit’ - fictional story about migrants travelling to America.

Monisha Rajesh. Round India on 80 trains then Round the World on 80 trains. Highly recommend both.

Travels without my aunt by Julia Llewellyn smith

Also books by or about Mary Kingsley can be interesting

Thank you, they all look super interesting! Can't wait to try out those recs.
Don't know what it is about all the travel and adventure stuff, just can't get enough of it right now!

I enjoyed Subterranean by James Rollins

Dervla Murphy - Full Tilt, Ireland to India on a Bike. Written in 1965 and it's another world. In fact anything by her.

The Light Garden of the Angel King by Peter Levy - travelling in Agfhanistan in the 70s with Bruce Chatwin.

First Russia Than Tibet and The Road to Oxiana by Robert Byron.

In the Empire of Genghis Khan by Stanley Stewart - across Mongolia on horseback.

All oldies but goodies.

This is one I’ve recommended several times - Barrow's Boys by Fergus Fleming. An absolutely gripping account of the various voyages of exploration initiated in the 19thc by John Barrow, who was Permanent Secretary to the Admiralty. The doomed Franklin expedition was one of the voyages that happened under his watch, but there were many more - and land expeditions too. Some of them are just bonkers….young men sallying forth on incredibly dangerous missions with not a clue what they were heading for. It’s a brilliantly entertaining book, I can’t recommend it highly enough!

Patrick Leigh-Fermor - A Time of Gifts (and his other books!)

The Worst Journey in the World - one of the best books ever written imho.

Barrow's Boys is good.

Touching the Void

Into Thin Air

Funny you should mention that one. Had picked it up second hand years ago but never read until recently when I happened upon it again. Absolutely fascinating...
And that's what rekindled my interest in that kind of writing!

Barrow's Boys sounds excellent, will check that out along with the other suggestions. Love having loads lined up in my Kindle.
I was gripped by Into Thin Air, watched Everest recently and was reminded of that whole story. A great though tragic read.

I enjoy Tim Moore's travel books. Good mix of humour and information.

I read Barrow's Boys years ago. To my everlasting regret I loaned it out and never saw it again.

A couple of novels:

Huntingtower by John Buchan - a really fun, silly romp of an adventure. Famous Five for grownups

Where Eagles Dare - Alistair Maclean - World War Two thriller

Where Eagles Dare - Alistair Maclean - World War Two thriller

Used to love AMC as a teenager - DGF was given his books every Christmas. I haven't read one for years and imagine they're pretty dated but I recall that one as really gripping.

Hugely recommend “The Expedition” books by Jason Lewis, especially book 1.

Dark Waters (The Expedition Trilogy, Book 1): True Story of the First Human-Powered Circumnavigation of the Earth: Volume 1 https://amzn.eu/d/afX3koO

He and a friend decided to do the first human powered circumnavigation of the globe. They were woefully underprepared in nearly every way, but he really committed to it, and what he put in was extraordinary. Also nuts. He’s an odd character but I found the books very distinctive and compelling.

Wave Walker by Suzanne Haywood.

Also anything by Eric Newby - recently read this one:

Love and War in the Apennines https://amzn.eu/d/bAVPU5X

He was an escaped POW in Italy in WW2, and the locals hid him and helped him to escape detection at great risk. He kept having to move about to avoid detection. It’s very very well written and I think he’s written loads of other great travel books but I’ve not read those yet.

A couple of non fiction ones - Tracks by Robin (can't remember surname offhand) a women who walks across Australia with a couple of camels. Wild by Cheryl Strayed - a woman who walks the Pacific crest trail in America, and of course, anything by Dervla Murphy - I love the ones where she is travelling with her young daughter in Peru, India and Baltistan.

Nice to see other Dervla Murphy and Tim Severin fans. OP, try Redmond O’Hanlon’s Into the Heart of Borneo, or In Trouble Again (which is about a journey between the Orinoco and the Amazon).

Also, Patrick Leigh-Fermor’s trilogy is wonderful.