Adventure Travel Memoirs

Updated June 6, 2026
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Wild : from lost to found on the Pacific Crest Trail
Strayed, Cheryl
Paper Book
NATIONAL BEST SELLER * Oprah's Book Club 2.0 selection. * A powerful, blazingly honest memoir: the story of an eleven-hundred-mile solo hike that broke down a young woman reeling from catastrophe--and built her back up again. A Kirkus Reviews Best Nonfiction Book of the...
We came, we saw, we left : a family gap year
Wheelan, Charles J.
Paper Book
Charlie Wheelan and his family do what others dream of: They take a year off to travel the world. This is their story. What would happen if you quit your life for a year? In a pre-COVID-19 world, the Wheelan family decided to find out; leaving behind work, school, and even the family...
Spirit run : a 6,000-mile marathon through North America's stolen land
?lvarez, No
Paper Book
In this New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice, the son of working-class Mexican immigrants flees a life of labor in fruit-packing plants to run in a Native American marathon from Canada to Guatemala in this "stunning memoir that moves to the rhythm of feet, labor, and the many...
The Sun is a Compass : A 4,000-Mile Journey into the Alaskan Wilds
Van Hemert, Caroline
Paper Book
For fans of Cheryl Strayed, the gripping story of a biologist's human-powered journey from the Pacific Northwest to the Arctic to rediscover her love of birds, nature, and adventure. During graduate school, as she conducted experiments on the...
A walk in the park : the true story of a spectacular misadventure in the Grand Canyon
Fedarko, Kevin
Paper Book
* Winner of the National Outdoor Book Award in Outdoor Literature * Winner of the Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Nonfiction * Named a Best Book of the Year by The New York Times, Air Mail, Smithsonian Magazine, and Financial Times "A...
Blue highways : a journey into America
Heat-Moon, William Least.
Paper Book
Bicycling with butterflies : my 10,201-mile journey following the monarch migration
Dykman, Sara
Paper Book
Winner of the 2021 National Outdoor Book Award Sara Dykman made history when she became the first person to bicycle alongside monarch butterflies on their storied annual migration--a round-trip adventure that included three countries and more than 10,000 miles....
How to be a family : the year I dragged my kids around the world to find a new way to be together
Kois, Dan
Paper Book
In this "refreshingly relatable" (Outside) memoir, perfect for the self-isolating family, Slate editor Dan Kois sets out with his family on a journey around the world to change their lives together. What happens when one frustrated dad turns his kids'...
A walk in the woods
Bryson, Bill.
Paper Book
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * The classic chronicle of a "terribly misguided and terribly funny" (The Washington Post) hike of the Appalachian Trail, from the author of A Short History of Nearly Everything and The Body  ...
Wandering in strange lands : a daughter of the Great Migration reclaims her roots
Jerkins, Morgan
Ebook
One of TIME's 100 Must Read Books of 2020 and one of Good Housekeeping's Best Books of the Year "One of the smartest young writers of her generation."--Book Riot From New York Times bestselling author of This Will Be My Undoing Morgan Jerkins, a powerful story of her journey to...
Eat, pray, love : one woman's search for everything across Italy, India and Indonesia
Gilbert, Elizabeth
Paper Book
One of the most iconic, beloved, and bestselling books of our time. This beautifully written, heartfelt memoir touched a nerve among both readers and reviewers. Elizabeth Gilbert tells how she made the difficult choice to leave behind all the trappings of modern American success...
The ride of her life : the true story of a woman, her horse, and their last-chance journey across America
Letts, Elizabeth
Paper Book
NATIONAL BESTSELLER .The #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Perfect Horse and The Eighty-Dollar Champion presents a "heartwarming and engaging folk-hero biography" (Kirkus Reviews) of a woman who fulfilled her lifelong wish to see the Pacific Ocean by riding...
The lost city of the Monkey God
Preston, Douglas J.
Paper Book
The #1 New York Times and Wall Street Journal bestseller. Named one of the best books of the year by The Boston Globe and National Geographic. An acclaimed journalist takes readers on a true...
Down under
Bryson, Bill.
Paper Book
It is the driest, flattest, hottest, most desiccated, infertile and climatically aggressive of all the inhabited continents and still Australia teems with life âe" a large portion of it quite deadly. In fact, Australia has more things that can kill you in a very nasty way than anywhere else. ...
Thirty below : the harrowing and heroic story of the first all-women's ascent of Denali
Randall, Cassidy
Paper Book
The gripping story of a group of female adventurers and their treacherous pioneering ascent of Denali. Excerpted in Vanity Fair, Rolling Stone, and Men's Journal, and named one of the most noteworthy books of the month by the Washington Post ...
Nowhere for very long : the unexpected road to an unconventional life
Madia, Brianna
Paper Book
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * WALL STREET JOURNAL BESTSELLER * USA TODAY! BESTSELLER In this beautifully written, vividly detailed memoir, a young woman chronicles her adventures traveling across the deserts of the American West in an orange van named...
The way of the hermit : my incredible 40 years living in the wilderness
Smith, Ken (Hermit of Treig)
Paper Book
*INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER* Subconsciously, I pressed myself into the loch's banks as that summer inched forward. We'd got off to a rocky beginning, but I started to see Treig in a different way. There was something about this land that told me just to hold on a while...
Things become other things : a walking memoir
Mod, Craig
Paper Book
A transformative 300-mile walk along Japan's ancient pilgrimage routes and through depopulating villages inspires a heartrending remembrance of a long-lost friend, documented in poignant, imaginative prose and remarkable photography. "An epic, exquisitely detailed journey, on...
Tracks
Davidson, Robyn
Paper Book
A revised, reissued fortieth anniversary edition of this prize-winning, bestselling account of one woman's solo journey across 1,700 miles of Australian Outback 'I experienced that sinking feeling you get when you know you have conned yourself into doing something difficult and...
Leave only footprints : my Acadia-to-Zion journey through every national park
Knighton, Conor
Paper Book
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * "A delightful sampler plate of our national parks, written with charisma and erudition."--Nick Offerman, author of Paddle Your Own Canoe From CBS Sunday Morning correspondent Conor Knighton, a behind-the-scenery look at...
North : finding my way while running the Appalachian Trail
Jurek, Scott
Paper Book
From the author of the bestseller Eat and Run, a thrilling memoir about his grueling, exhilarating, and immensely inspiring 46-day run to break the speed record for the Appalachian Trail. Scott Jurek is one of the world's best known and most beloved ultrarunners....
Welcome to the goddamn ice cube : chasing fear and finding home in the great white north
Braverman, Blair
Paper Book
A rich and revelatory memoir of a young woman reclaiming her courage in the stark landscapes of the north. By the time Blair Braverman was eighteen, she had left her home in California, moved to arctic Norway to learn to drive sled dogs, and found work as a tour guide on a glacier in...
Mother of God
Rosolie, Paul
Paper Book
Madre de Dios - 'Mother of God' - is a place where the Andean Cloud Forest intermingles with the steaming tropical jungle at the head of the Amazon river. Here can be found the greatest proliferation of living species that has ever existed on Earth. And it is a place which is now under grave threat....
The world walk : 7 years. 28,000 miles. 6 continents. : a grand meditation, one step at a time
Turcich, Tom
Paper Book
For fans of Jon Krakauer's Into the Wild and Suleika Jaouad's Between Two Kingdoms, the invigorating true story of a man and his dog who circled the globe on foot. "Gripping . . . The World Walk ...
To shake the sleeping self : a journey from Oregon to Patagonia, and a quest for a life with no regret
Jenkins, Jedidiah
Paper Book
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * "With winning candor, Jedidiah Jenkins takes us with him as he bicycles across two continents and delves deeply into his own beautiful heart."--Cheryl Strayed, author of Wild and Tiny Beautiful Things  ...
Enough : climbing toward a true self on Mount Everest
Reid, Melissa Arnot
Paper Book
A searching, uplifting memoir by the celebrated, groundbreaking climber: a journey of overcoming where the mountain's highest peaks can only be reached by traversing the dark crevasses of the soul At twenty-seven, when Melissa Arnot Reid accepted a tank of oxygen just short of...
Tip of the iceberg : my 3,000-mile journey around wild Alaska, the last great American frontier
Adams, Mark
Ebook
**The National Bestseller** From the acclaimed, bestselling author of Turn Right at Machu Picchu, a fascinating, wild, and wonder-filled journey into Alaska, America's last frontier In 1899, railroad magnate Edward H. Harriman organized a most unusual summer...
The adventurer's son : a memoir
Dial, Roman
Paper Book
NATIONAL BESTSELLER  "Destined to become an adventure classic." --Anchorage Daily News Hailed as "gripping" (New York Times) and "beautiful" (Washington Post), The Adventurer's Son is Roman Dial's extraordinary and widely acclaimed account of his two-year quest to unravel...
Dark star safari : overland from Cairo to Cape Town
Theroux, Paul.
Paper Book
Safari in Swahili means a journey, typically a long one. In Dark Star Safari, Theroux's itinerary is African, from Cairo to Cape Town - down the Nile, through Sudan and Ethiopia, to Kenya, Uganda and beyond to South Africa. Journeying by train, boat and cattle truck, he passes through some of the...
Call you when I land : a memoir
Vargas, Nikki
Paper Book
"I absolutely loved it. It's so good. So real and heartfelt and funny and rich with life." -CHERYL STRAYED * A Real Simple Book Club Pick * Hudson Bestseller *  Winner of the 2024 Bessie Award * A RECOMMENDED READ FROM: Good Morning...
Lands of lost borders : a journey on the Silk Road
Harris, Kate
Paper Book
"Lands of Lost Borders carried me up into a state of openness and excitement I haven't felt for years. It's a modern classic."--Pico Iyer A brilliant, fierce writer, and winner of the 2019 RBC Taylor Prize, makes her debut with this enthralling travelogue and memoir of her...
The catch me if you can : one woman's journey to every country in the world
Nabongo, Jessica
Paper Book
In this inspiring travelogue, celebrated traveler and photographer Jessica Nabongo―the first Black woman on record to visit all 195 countries in the world―shares her journey around the globe with fascinating stories of adventure, culture, travel musts, and human connections. ...
Tales of a female nomad : living at large in the world
Gelman, Rita Golden.
Paper Book
There's more than one way to do life. In a small cemetery deep in the jungle of Borneo, two men climb into a freshly dug hole and retrieve the bones of a long-dead grandmother. An American guest joins the procession from the cemetery to the elaborately decorated village square for a traditional...
Walking the Nile
Wood, Levison
Paper Book
A major Channel 4 series and a Sunday Times bestseller His journey is 4,250 miles long. He is walking every step of the way, camping in the wild, foraging for food, fending for himself against multiple dangers. He is passing through rainforest, savannah, swamp, desert and lush delta oasis. He will...
Girl in the woods : a memoir
Matis, Aspen
Paper Book
Girl in the Woods is Aspen Matis's exhilarating true-life adventure of hiking from Mexico to Canada--a coming of age story, a survival story, and a triumphant story of overcoming emotional devastation. On her second night of college, Aspen was raped by a fellow student. Overprotected by her...
The Amur River : between Russia and China
Thubron, Colin
Paper Book
'Thubron on top form. Richly detailed, immaculately written and full of insights and encounters that bring a complex corner of the world to life' Michael Palin A dramatic and ambitious new journey for our greatest travel writer The Amur River is almost unknown...
After the North Pole : a story of survival, mythmaking, and melting ice
Kagge, Erling
Paper Book
"A dazzling book -- soulful, awe-inspiring, and deeply thought-provoking. Erling Kagge takes readers on a journey they'll never forget." -- Jonathan Eig, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of King: A Life "After the North Pole is a thrilling, insightful, and magical journey with something...
The Good Girl's Guide to Getting Lost
Friedman, Rachel
Ebook
Rachel Friedman has always been the consummate good girl who does well in school and plays it safe, so the college grad surprises no one more than herself when, on a whim (and in an effort to escape impending life decisions), she buys a ticket to Ireland, a place she has never visited. There she...
Hudson Bay bound : two women, one dog, two thousand miles to the Arctic
Warren, Natalie
Paper Book
The remarkable eighty-five-day journey of the first two women to canoe the 2,000-mile route from Minneapolis to Hudson Bay Unrelenting winds, carnivorous polar bears, snake nests, sweltering heat, and constant hunger. Paddling from Minneapolis to Hudson Bay, following the 2,000-mile...
Mother, nature : a 5,000-mile journey to discover if a mother and son can survive their differences
Jenkins, Jedidiah
Paper Book
NATIONAL BESTSELLER * From the author of To Shake the Sleeping Self . . . "Exquisitely written and completely compelling . . . As Jedidiah Jenkins traces a 5,000-mile route with his wildly entertaining mother, Barb, he begins to untangle the live wires of a parent-child...
Dogtripping : 25 rescues, 11 volunteers, and 3 RVs on our canine cross-country adventure
Rosenfelt, David.
Paper Book
David Rosenfelt'sDogtripping is moving and funny account of a cross-country move from California to Maine, and the beginnings of a dog rescue foundation When mystery writer David Rosenfelt and his family moved from Southern California to Maine, he thought he had prepared for...
Blood river : a journey to Africa's broken heart
Butcher, Tim
Paper Book
**THE NUMBER ONE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER** A compulsively readable account of an African country now virtually inaccessible to the outside world and one journalist's daring and adventurous journey. When war correspondent Tim Butcher...
Swimming to Antarctica : tales of a long-distance swimmer
Cox, Lynne
Paper Book
International Swimming Hall of Famer and Alex Award-winner Lynne Cox's classic sports memoir Swimming to Antarctica is "a portrait of rare and relentless drive" (Sports Illustrated).Here is the acclaimed life story of a woman whose determination inspires everyone she touches. Lynne Cox started...
Rough magic : riding the world's loneliest horse race
Prior-Palmer, Lara
Ebook
In the shadow of the mountain : a memoir of courage
Vasquez-Lavado, Silvia
Paper Book
"In climbing the Seven Summits, Silvia Vasquez-Lavado did nothing less than take back her own life--one brave step at a time. She will inspire untold numbers of souls with this story, for her victory is a win on behalf of all of us."--Elizabeth Gilbert Endless ice. Thin air....
Walking the Amazon : 860 days, the impossible task, the incredible journey
Stafford, Ed.
Paper Book
On 9th August 2010, Ed Stafford became the first person ever to walk the entire length of the Amazon river. This text takes readers on his daring journey along the world's greatest river and through the most bio-diverse habitat on Earth.
Love with a chance of drowning : a memoir
DeRoche, Torre.
Paper Book
New love. Exotic destinations. A once-in-a-lifetime adventure. What could go wrong? City girl Torre DeRoche isn't looking for love, but a chance encounter in a San Francisco bar sparks an instant connection with a soulful Argentinean man who unexpectedly sweeps her off her feet. The problem?...
Walking to listen : 4,000 miles across America, one story at a time
Forsthoefel, Andrew
Paper Book
A memoir of one young man's coming of age on a journey across America--told through the stories of the people of all ages, races, and inclinations he meets along the way. Life is fast, and I've found it's easy to confuse the miraculous for the mundane, so I'm slowing down,...
A Paris year : my day-to-day adventures in the most romantic city in the world
MacLeod, Janice
Paper Book
Part memoir and part visual journey through the streets of modern-day Paris, France, A Paris Year chronicles, day by day, one woman's French sojourn in the world's most beautiful city. Beginning on her first day in Paris, Janice MacLeod, the author of the best-selling book, Paris Letters,<...
Terra incognita : travels in Antarctica
Wheeler, Sara.
Paper Book
Sara Wheeler was the first woman selected by the American government to be the Writer in Residence at the US South Pole Station. She spent six weeks at the pole. In this book she reveals how people live on the bases and how the landscape affects them.
No barriers : a blind man's journey to kayak the Grand Canyon
Weihenmayer, Erik
Paper Book
2018 Colorado Book Awards finalist in Creative Nonfiction, and National Bestseller and Honorable Mention Award Winner in the Outdoor Literature category of the 2017 National Outdoor Book Awards (NOBA) -- "A beautiful book about family and finding a way to achieve...
Becoming Forrest : one man's epic run across America
Pope, Rob
Paper Book
The remarkable true story of an unrivalled journey to recreate the greatest run in film history: 15,621 miles, five-times across the United States. 'Rob Pope has made his name revelling in challenges that range from the unconventional to the extraordinary.' BBC News ...
Amazon woman : facing fears, chasing dreams, and a quest to kayak the world's largest river from source to sea
Gaechter, Darcy
Paper Book
An extraordinary and inspiring chronicle of one woman's harrowing journey to become the first female to kayak the entire Amazon River. Part memoir, part feminist manifesto, Amazon Woman shows what incredible feats we are capable of and...
Portage : a family, a canoe, and the search for the good life
Leaf, Sue
Paper Book
When as a child she first saw a canoe gliding on Lake Alexander in central Minnesota, Sue Leaf was mesmerized. The enchantment stayed with her and shimmers throughout this book as we join Leaf and her family in canoeing the waterways of North America, always on the lookout for the good life...
Moms who hike : walking with America's most inspiring adventurers
Rochfort, Heather Balogh
Paper Book
Moms Who Hike celebrates the athleticism, wisdom, and skill of over twenty of America's most inspiring adventurer mothers ranging from legends to rising stars of today. The book is both inspirational and aspirational as each adventurer tells her story in her own words through featuring their...
Turn right at Machu Picchu : rediscovering the lost city one step at a time
Adams, Mark
Paper Book
Mark Adams has spent his career editing adventure and travel magazines, polishing hair-raising tales about the exploits of famous explorers. So his plan to investigate the allegations against Bingham by retracing the explorer's perilous path to Machu Picchu isn't completely far-fetched, even if it...
Travels with Charley : in search of America
Steinbeck, John
Paper Book
An intimate journey across and in search of America, as told by one of its most beloved writers, in a deluxe centennial edition In September 1960, John Steinbeck embarked on a journey across America. He felt that he might have lost touch with the country, with its speech, the...
Notes from a small island
Bryson, Bill.
Paper Book
Featuring an all-new cover, New York Times bestseller Bill Bryson's irrevent and hilarious journey through the beloved island nation he called home for two decades. From Downing Street to Loch Ness, this is a delightful look at the United Kingdom. Before New York Times...
The sex lives of cannibals
Troost, J. Maarten.
Paper Book
Let me say at the top that I didn't have a particularly good reason for moving to Tarawa, a small island in the Republic of Kiribati. There was nothing Quaker-ish, Thoreau-ish or even Gaughin-ish about my taking a little leave from western civilisation which I though was fine mostly, particularly as...
In Patagonia
Chatwin, Bruce
Paper Book
The masterpiece of travel writing that revolutionized the genre and made its author famous overnight   An exhilarating look at a place that still retains the exotic mystery of a far-off, unseen land, Bruce Chatwin's exquisite account of his journey through Patagonia teems...
The Geography of Bliss One Grump's Search for the Happiest Places in the World
Weiner, Eric
Ebook
Now a new series on Peacock with Rainn Wilson, THE GEOGRAPHY OF BLISS is part travel memoir, part humor, and part twisted self-help guide that takes the viewer across the globe to investigate not what happiness is, but WHERE it is. Are people in Switzerland happier...
Without reservations : the travels of an independent woman
Steinbach, Alice
Paper Book
"In many ways, I was an independent woman," writes Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Alice Steinbach. "For years I'd made my own choices, paid my own bills, shoveled my own snow." But somehow she had become dependent in quite another way. "I had fallen into the habit of defining myself in terms of...
The salt path
Winn, Raynor
Paper Book
The story of the couple who lost everything and embarked on a journey, not of escape, but salvation. Just days after Raynor learns that Moth, her husband of 32 years, is terminally ill, the couple lose their home and their livelihood. With nothing left and little time, they make...
Under the Tuscan sun : at home in Italy
Mayes, Frances.
Paper Book
#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * The beloved memoir of self-discovery set against the spectacular Tuscan countryside that inspired the major motion picture starring Diane Lane--now in a twentieth-anniversary edition featuring a new afterword   "This...
Ghost rider : travels on the healing road
Peart, Neil.
Paper Book
Within a ten-month period, Neil Peart lost both his 19-year-old daughter, Selena, and his wife, Jackie. Faced with overwhelming sadness and isolated from the world in his home on the lake, Peart was left without direction. This memoir tells of the sense of personal devastation that led him on a 55...
A voyage for madmen
Nichols, Peter
Paper Book
"An extraordinary story of bravery and insanity on the high seas. . . . One of the most gripping sea stories I have ever read." -- Sebastian Junger, author of The Perfect Storm In the tradition of Into Thin Air and The Perfect Storm, comes a breathtaking oceanic adventure about...

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