Straight from My Bookshelves: Feet, Trains, Boats, and Automobiles

Some of the books on my bookshelves have been there so long now that they have just become part of my everyday background. I'm so used to seeing them there that I don't actually see them anymore. But even though I know that I'm unlikely to read most of them ever again, I also know that I will not part with them until the day that becomes absolutely necessary. 

One particular section of my smallest bookcase caught my eye this morning. I really enjoy reading books about long journeys, be they accomplished on foot, or by bike, boat, train, or car. I have more than a dozen books of this type - and just handling them today gives me the itch to get back on the road as soon as this virus-thing is finally over.

Here are a few of them: 

This 1988 book is British writer George Meegan's account of what turned into a walk of almost seven years. It started at the southernmost tip of South America in January 1977 and ended on the northernmost shores of Alaska in September 1983. In case you're wondering, that's a total of 19,019 miles. Meegan's Japanese wife joined him for some of the walk - but got pregnant twice along the way and had to go home to Japan.

Another one from 1988 is Paul Theroux's Riding the Iron Rooster. This one is usually billed as the author's train ride all the way from the scorching Gobi to "the frozen wastes of Manchuria." Interestingly enough, though, because Theroux did not want to experience jet lag, the trip actually starts on a London train to Mongolia with stops along the way in Paris, Warsaw, and the Soviet Union. This one made me a Paul Theroux fan for life.

This 1983 Paul Theroux book may have been the one that started me acquiring my small collection of "trek books." I actually read this one in 1983 while traveling around the country on a BritRail pass along with my wife. That's probably what made the book so memorable to me, because I have to admit that I tried to read it again a few years later and found it a little too negative for my taste. I may give it a "third try" just to see what kind of reaction I have to it. 

There have been some brilliant road trip books about the U.S., too, and one of my favorites is this 1997 book from Mike Bryan. Personally, my road trips are almost exclusively accomplished via America's backroads. Bryan takes exactly the opposite approach on the road trip he describes here - staying on Interstate Highways the whole time. It didn't convince me to change my trip planning methodology, but it was a fun and insightful read.

Peter Jenkins is best known for some of his own "long walk" books, but this 1995 book in which he travels America's Gulf Coast by boat is one of my favorite's of his (probably because I'm pretty familiar with much of his route). Jenkins started his trip in the Florida Keys and ended it when he reached the Mexican border. Because you can't make that trip without passing through Louisiana and Texas waters, I found this one pretty intriguing. It's fun to see what kind of impression your home area makes on any outsider, but especially an experienced traveler like Jenkins.

It was fun flipping the pages of these books again. And now I wonder how long I can resist re-reading at least a few of them.