Books on travel

My head is happiest in a book, for 20 minutes before bed time to switch off my mind from work, or under a blanket on the sofa for a lazy weekend afternoon (in the sun is better).  If I’m not reading other lovely blogs, I don’t often read about ‘travel’, tending to stick to ‘3 for 2’ fiction on offer in Waterstones, or books passed to me by my Mum!  Travel guides are more typically read by either me or Mr P on the plane on the way to a destination to boost our knowledge from the internet research already done. But with the advent of Pinterest – I don’t rely on them so much now.

A typical day on holiday – nose in a book!

In our living room we have a handful of travel books – doesn’t everyone – and I tend to flick through these when inspiration is needed (or if it is cold and grey outside).  Each is well-thumbed!  Gorgeous pictures and countless ideas.  My favourite is The Big Short Trip as this is full of short (obviously) trips at often lesser known locations and with some great hotel recommendations.  I blame this book entirely for sending us to stay at the Chedi and for us just booking a trip to Gozo!

I have however read a fair few ‘travel’ books recently so I thought I would share these with you as recommendations.

Firstly some classic coffee table travel guides which inspire me full of ideas:

The Big Short Break is a book I adore – it is by the company Original Travel who design some of the most beautiful itineraries with photography to sell it home.  We have had this book for many years and it is still a source of ideas, it cleverly splits trips up into topics and recommended times of year so is very helpful!  Daphne Du Maurier’s Vanishing Cornwall is of course a popular book in our house – what I particularly like is that it isn’t new, so the places mentioned are old favourites and often not quite as main stream as other guides.  125 years of National Geographic and The Travel Book are full of great pictures and interesting statistics – perfect for brightening a gloomy winter day.

A recent discovery has been finding good fiction that is based on an individual’s trip.  As a keen sailor all my life I grew up with Swallows and Amazons by Arthur Ransome. I saw three ways to capsize a boat on a friends bookshelf and immediately bought it from Amazon.  Chris Stewart has such a good way of writing – the book was riveting and we are now laughing our way through another of his tales.  I really enjoyed this book as it was set in Greece and he describes the character and charm of the people and places so well.  Love with a chance of drowning is another water based adventure that I couldn’t put down – I do hope Torre de Roche carries on writing, she does happily have a lovely blog!  Since reading these we have been slowly buying up the ‘travel writing’ shelf of our local Waterstones – great humour is often found in someone else’s real life tale!And then there are the fiction books that aren’t really about travel but are.  A Dark Devotion was a thriller that struck a real chord when I read it – I hadn’t realised it would be based in an area of Norfolk I knew so well, so it was a little more chilling than expected, but even more difficult to put down!  The Lost Library I read recently and I found it fascinating – I enjoy how books such as this (and those by Dan Brown) mix fiction with such a lot of historical information I wouldn’t have any knowledge of otherwise.

Back to travel – one book I don’t recommend you read before you take part in this yacht race (non-stop from Cowes round the rock off Ireland and back to Plymouth) is Fastnet Force 10 – a reminder of how dangerous sailing can be and just how powerful nature is.  Since starting blogging I’ve been more interested in reading about other people’s travel experience and The Art of Travel and Gatecrashing Paradise are two such examples that I enjoyed – the former was quite a hard read but the latter I found difficult to put down, it was so interesting to see another side of the Maldives.

Whilst I love reading, I’m not sure how well it has transferred to a map-reading skill… I achieved my Gold Duke of Edinbugh’s award way back at school, but looking at these photos Mr P took on recent trips, maps seem to have me stumped!

Not all those who wander are lost!

I hope you enjoy these recommendations, I’m always interested to hear about others so feel free to suggest more in the comments – especially as I am yet to choose my books for our upcoming trip to Maine!