List of travel books
have been written since Classical times. Those that are by notable authors and are themselves notable are listed here. Other books, even if by notable travel authors, are not included.
Note: Listed by year of publication of the majority of the writer's notable works.
Ancient Near East
- Wenamun, Egyptian priest
- :Story of Wenamun, account of his travels through the Mediterranean sea.
Classical Antiquity
- Xenophon
- :Anabasis - about the expedition of Cyrus the Younger, a Persian prince, against his brother, King Artaxerxes II. The book then moves on to Cyrus' Greek troops travels through Asia Minor back home to Greece.
- Lucian of Samosata
- :True History documents a fantastic voyage that parodies many mythical travels recounted by other authors, such as Homer; considered to be among the first works of science fiction.
- Pausanias
- :Description of Greece
- Decimus Magnus Ausonius
- :Mosella describes the poet's trip to the banks of the river Moselle, then in Gaul.
- Faxian, Chinese traveler to India and Ceylon
- :
- Rutilius Claudius Namatianus
- :De reditu suo the poet describes his voyage along the Mediterranean seacoast from Rome to Gaul.
- Navigatio Sancti Brendani Abbatis describes Saint Brendan's alleged voyage to North America.
- Cosmas Indicopleustes, Byzantine traveler who made several voyages to India during the reign of emperor Justinian.
- :Christian Topography
Tang dynasty
- Xuanzang
- :Great Tang Records on the Western Regions narrative of the Buddhist monk's journey from China to India.
- Hyecho
- :Wang ocheonchukguk jeon, travelogue by Buddhist monk Hyecho, who pilgrimaged from Korea to India.
- Ennin, Japanese Buddhist monk who chronicled his travels in Tang China
- :
10th century
- Ibn Hawqal, Arab writer, geographer, and chronicler. Travelled to remote parts of the European Mediterranean, Asia and Africa. Ṣūrat al-’Arḍ.
- Ahmad ibn Fadlan, Kitab ila Mulk al-Saqaliba
11th century
- Nasir Khusraw, Persian traveler in the Middle East
- :Safarnama
12th century
- Abu ad-Din al-Husayn Muhammad ibn Ahmad ibn Jubayr
- :The Travels of Ibn Jubayr
- Gerald of Wales
- :Itinerarium Cambriae
13th century
- Yaqut al-Hamawi
- :Mu'jam Al-Buldan
- The Vinland Sagas
- Giovanni da Pian del Carpine, franciscan missionary and archbishop of Antivari
- :Ystoria Mongalorum, the report of his embassy to the Great Khan on behalf of the Papacy. It is the oldest European account of the Mongols.
- William of Rubruck
- :Itinerarium fratris Willielmi de Rubruquis de ordine fratrum Minorum, Galli, Anno gratia 1253 ad partes Orientales
- Marco Polo, Venetian traveller to China and the Mongol Empire, and Rustichello da Pisa, writer.
- :Il Milione
14th century
- John of Montecorvino, Italian Franciscan missionary, founder of the earliest Roman Catholic missions in India and China. Archbishop of Cambalec.
- : Letters
- Odoric of Pordenone, Franciscan missionary who visited China
- :Viaggio del beato frate odorico di porto maggiore del friuli...
- Ibn Battuta, Moroccan world traveler
- :Rihla literally entitled: "A Gift to Those Who Contemplate the Wonders of Cities and the Marvels of Traveling".
- Giovanni de' Marignolli
- : Cronica Boemorum
- John Mandeville, fictional character.
- :The Travels of Sir John Mandeville, an imaginary account of his travels in Asia based on a variety of true sources about the eastern countries, such as Pordenone's.
15th century
- Johannes Witte de Hese
- :Itinerarius, a fictional account with fantastic elements and impossible geography
- Ruy Gonzáles de Clavijo, Spanish ambassador of Henry III of Castile to the court of Timur.
- :Narrative of the Embassy of Ruy Gonzalez de Clavijo to the Court of Timour at Samarcand AD 1403-6.
- Ghiyath al-din Naqqash who wrote, in Persian, a detailed account of his travel from Herat to Beijing on a diplomatic mission in 1420-1422. It became one of the most detailed accounts of China in the Persian and Turkish literature for the next century or two.
- Ma Huan and Fei Xin, each of whom wrote a book about the lands visited with Zheng He's fleet.
- Niccolò de' Conti, an Italian merchant who explored India, China and Indonesia from 1419 to 1444.
- :His travel account was written by request of Pope Eugene IV and is included in Book IV of "De varietate fortunae" by Poggio Bracciolini.
- Pedro Tafur Spanish diplomat of king Juan II of Castile. He travelled across Europe, Morocco and the Near East.
- :Andanças e viajes de Pero Tafur por diversas partes del mundo avidos.
- Afanasy Nikitin, Russian merchant, traveler and writer, A Journey Beyond the Three Seas
- Conrad Grünenberg, Pilgrimage to the Holy Land
- Christopher Columbus, Journal of the first voyage
16th century
- Ludovico di Varthema, italian traveler, first non-Muslim european to enter Mecca as a pilgrim.
- : The Itinerary of Ludovico Di Varthema of Bologna from 1502 to 1508
- Zahir-ud-din Muhammad Babur, founder of the Mughal Empire
- :Baburnama, memoirs, including his descriptions of the places he lived and/or conquered.
- Duarte Barbosa, Portuguese writer and explorer who died in Magellan's circumnavigation
- :
- Antonio Pigafetta, Venetian explorer.
- :Relazione del primo viaggio intorno al mondo. An account of the first circumnavigation of the globe.
- Gaspar da Cruz
- : Tratado das cousas da China became the first book-length work on China in Europe; it also told about the author's experiences in Cambodia and Hormuz
- Piri Reis Turkish geographer known for his World Map.
- : Kitab-ı Bahriye, a detailed book about the Mediterranean Sea.
- Álvar Núñez Cabeza de Vaca, Spanish conqueror and explorer
- :La Relación. An account of his eight year's captivity and exploration in North America.
- Fernão Mendes Pinto, Portuguese explorer and writer
- :Peregrinação memoir of his travels in the Middle and Far East, Ethiopia, Arabian Sea, India and Japan, as one of the first Europeans to reach it in 1542.
- Giovanni Battista Ramusio, Venetian geographer and compiler
- :Navigationi et Viaggi ; a large collection of explorers' first-hand accounts of their travels around the world, the first one of its kind.
- Luís de Camões
- :Os Lusíadas
- Richard Hakluyt, English priest and travel writings compiler
- :The Principall Navigations, Voiages and Discoveries of the English Nation a foundational text of the travel literature genre.
- Seydi Ali Reis, Turkish sailor.
- :Mirat ul Memalik about his voyage to India
- Anthony Knivet, British sailor and privateer, who was held captive in Brazil by the Portuguese and then by the indigenous Tupí.
- :The Admirable Adventures and Strange Fortunes of Master Antonie Knivet, which went with Master Thomas Candish in his Second Voyage to the South Sea
- Jan Huyghen van Linschoten, Dutch merchant, trader, and historian who traveled throughout India and Southeast Asia as a secretary to the Portuguese Viceroy.
- :Itinerario, published in English as Discours of Voyages into Y East & West Indies
17th century
- Samuel de Champlain,, French explorer, founder of New France & Quebec City.
- :Des Sauvages: ou voyage de Samuel Champlain, de Brouages, faite en la France nouvelle l'an 1603
- :Brief Discours des Choses plus remarquables que Sammuel Champlain de Brouage a reconneues aux Indes Occidentalles au voiage qu'il en a faict en icettes en l'année 1599 et en l'année 1601, comme ensuite
- :Voyages de la Nouvelle France
- :Traitté de la marine et du devoir d'un bon marinier
- Samuel Purchas,, English cleric and travel writings compiler.
- :Purchas, his Pilgrimage; or, Relations of the World and the Religions observed in all Ages,
- :Purchas, his Pilgrim. Microcosmus, or the historie of Man. Relating the wonders of his Generation, vanities in his Degeneration, Necessity of his Regeneration,
- :Hakluytus Posthumus or Purchas his Pilgrimes, contayning a History of the World in Sea Voyages and Lande Travells, by Englishmen and others,.
- Thomas Coryat,, English traveller
- : Coryat's Crudities hastily gobbled up in Five Months Travels
- Pedro Páez,, Spanish jesuit missionary in Ethiopia
- : History of Ethiopia, includes the first account of one of the sources of the Nile River ever written by a European.
- Evliya Çelebi,, Turkish traveller
- : Seyahatname
- Johann Sigmund Wurffbain
- :Reise Nach Den Molukken Und Vorder-Indien, 1632–1646
- François de La Boullaye-Le Gouz
- :Les voyages et observations du sieur de La Boullaye Le gouz one of the very first true travel books.
- Edward Terry
- :A Voyage to East-India
- Pietro Della Valle,, Italian who traveled throughout Asia during the Renaissance period
- : The travels of Signor Pietro Della Valle, a Noble Roman, into East India and Arabia deserts...
- Jerónimo Lobo, a Portuguese Jesuit missionary in Ethiopia.
- :Itinerário. This book was translated by Samuel Johnson in 1723 and inspired his own work The History of Rasselas, Prince of Abissinia.
- François Bernier, personal physician of the Mughal emperor Aurangzeb during his long stay in India.
- :Travels in the Mogul Empire
- Jean-Baptiste Tavernier, gem merchant who made several trips to Persia and India between the years 1630 and 1668
- :Les Six Voyages de Jean-Baptiste Tavernier
- Jean Chardin, jewellery trader who travelled to Persia and India
- :The Travels of Sir John Chardin in Persia and the Orient.
- Matsuo Bashō
- :Kashima Kiko
- :Oi no Kobumi, or Utatsu Kiko
- :Sarashina Kiko
- :The Narrow Road to the Deep North and Other Travel Sketches
18th century
- George Shelvocke English privateer who carried out a Circumnavigation of the world.
- :A Voyage Round the World by Way of the Great South Sea, a book that inspired The Rime of the Ancient Mariner by Samuel Coleridge.
- Richard Pococke English bishop in Ireland, traveller in Europe and the Middle East
- :A Description of the East and Some other Countries
- Daniel Defoe English trader, writer, journalist, pamphletter, and spy.
- :"A tour thro' the whole island of Great Britain, first published in three volumes between 1724–1727, an account of Defoe's tours, or circuits, throughout England, Wales, and Scotland, with a focus on the social and cultural landscape as well as the geographic.
- Jonathan Swift
- :Gulliver's Travels
- Osman Aga of Temesvar Turkish soldier who wrote Gavurların Esiri in 1724 about his POW days in Austria
- Charles Marie de La Condamine, French geographer and mathematician who took part in the Geodesic Mission to Peru of 1735–1739, the first international scientific expedition.
- :Journal du voyage fait à l'Equateur servant d'introduction historique à la Mesure des trois premiers degrés du Méridien
- Jorge Juan y Santacilia and Antonio de Ulloa, two Spanish mathematicians who also participated in the aforementioned scientific expedition
- : Relación histórica del viage a la América Meridional
- Lady Mary Wortley Montagu known for the letters she wrote during several trips abroad, which were important for later female travel writers. These letters include:
- :Turkish Embassy Letters letters describing her life as an ambassador's wife in Turkey, important as one of the earliest discussions of the Muslim world by a woman
- Frederic Louis Norden, Danish naval captain
- :Voyage d'Egypte et de Nubie, contains the first drawings of ancient Egyptian monuments.
- Henry Fielding
- :"Journal of a Voyage to Lisbon"
- Ilarione da Bergamo Daily Life in Colonial Mexico: The Journey of Friar Ilarione da Bergamo, 1761-1768.
- Tobias Smollett
- :Travels through France and Italy
- Laurence Sterne
- :A Sentimental Journey Through France and Italy
- Louis Antoine de Bougainville, French navigator, explorer and military commander.
- :, a book about his circumnavigation, famous at its time for his description of Tahiti as an paradisiac utopia. It also inspired Diderot's Supplément au voyage de Bougainville.
- Samuel Johnson
- :A Journey to the Western Islands of Scotland the lexicographer and his friend James Boswell visit Scotland in 1773.
- James Boswell
- :"An Account of Corsica, The Journal of a Tour to That Island, and Memoirs of Pascal Paoli" the earliest piece of literature about the Grand Tour.
- :"The Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides with Samuel Johnson, LL.D" a travel journal by Boswell about his trip with Samuel Johnson to Scotland in 1773.
- James Bruce, a Scottish traveller in North Africa and Ethiopia.
- :Travels to Discover the Source of the Nile where he claims to have been the first European to discover the source of the Blue Nile, despite previous accounts by Paez and Lobo mentioned above.
- Thomas Jefferson
- :Thomas Jefferson Travels: Selected Writings, 1784-1789 record of Jefferson's travels in France, Holland, Germany and Italy, included in his Complete Works with selected portions in various collections of his writings.
- Ann Radcliffe
- :A Journey Made in the Summer of 1794
- Mary Wollstonecraft
- :A Short Residence in Sweden
- :Letters Written in Sweden, Norway, and Denmark
- Jippensha Ikku
- :Tokaidochu Hizakurige one of the most famous of the Edo period michiyuki novels.
- Sir Alexander MacKenzie
- :Voyages from Montreal Through the Continent of North America to the Frozen and Pacific Oceans in 1789 and 1793
19th century
- Johann Gottfried Seume
- :Spaziergang nach Syrakus
- Dorothy Wordsworth
- :Recollections of a Tour Made in Scotland, A. D. 1803
- John Quincy Adams
- :Letters on Silesia: Written During a Tour Through That Country in the Years 1800, 1801
- John Pinkerton
- :A General Collection of the Best and Most Interesting Voyages and Travels in All Parts of the World; many of which are now first translated into English.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
- :Italienische Reise
- Domingo Francisco Jorge Badía y Leblich, better known by his pseudonym Ali Bey el Abbassi, Spanish traveler and spy in the Middle East
- :Viajes de Ali Bey
- Sir Henry Holland, 1st Baronet
- :Travels in the Ionian Isles, Albania, Thessaly, Macedonia, &c., during the years 1812 and 1813
- Marie-Henri Beyle, French novelist
- :Rome, Naples et Florence
- Mary Shelley, English writer, author of Frankenstein
- :History of a Six Weeks' Tour
- :Rambles in Germany and Italy, in 1840, 1842, and 1843
- James Fenimore Cooper
- :Gleanings in Europe: Switzerland
- :Gleanings in Europe: The Rhine
- :Gleanings in Europe: England
- Marquis de Custine
- :Empire of the Czar: A Journey Through Eternal Russia
- Heinrich Heine
- :Reisebilder, Harzreise
- Frances Trollope
- :Domestic Manners of the Americans
- Washington Irving
- :The Alhambra : a series of tales and sketches of the Moors and Spaniards
- Fanny Parkes
- :Wanderings of a pilgrim in search of the picturesque, during four-and-twenty years in the East with revelations of life in the zenana, 2 vols
- :Begums, Thugs & Englishmen, the journals of Fanny Parkes
- Isabella Frances Romer
- :A Pilgrimage to the Temples and Tombs of Egypt, Nubia and Palestine in 1845–6
- Flora Tristan
- :Peregrinations of a Pariah
- :Promenades in London
- Karl Baedeker, German publisher whose company set the standard for authoritative guidebooks for tourists
- Rifa'a el-Tahtawi, Egyptian traveler to France
- :Takhlis al-Ibriz fi Talkhis Bariz
- Theodor Fontane, German novelist and poet
- :Wanderungen durch die Mark Brandenburg
- Lady Hester Stanhope the first modern "Holy Land" archaeologist, also a memoirist:
- :Memoirs of the Lady Hester Stanhope as related by herself in Conversations with her Physician
- :Travels of Lady Hester Stanhope, forming the Completion of her Memoirs narrated by her Physician
- George Borrow
- :The Bible in Spain
- :Wild Wales
- Susanna Moodie
- :Roughing it in the Bush
- John Lloyd Stephens
- :Incidents of Travel in Egypt, Arabia Petræa and the Holy Land
- :Incidents of Travel in Greece, Turkey, Russia and Poland
- :Incidents of Travel in Central American, Chiapas and Yucatan
- :Incidents of Travel in Yucatan
- Alexis de Tocqueville
- :Journey to America
- Nehemiah Adams
- :A South-Side View of Slavery
- Hans Christian Andersen
- :The Improvisatore
- Charles Darwin
- :The Voyage of the Beagle
- Alexander Kinglake
- :Eothen
- Charles Dickens
- :American Notes
- :Pictures from Italy
- Herman Melville
- :Typee: A Peep at Polynesian Life
- :Omoo: A Narrative of Adventures in the South Seas chronicles of Melville's experiences as a sailor in Polynesia.
- Gustave Flaubert left travel notes and letters, including:
- :Flaubert in Egypt: A Sensibility on Tour letters
- Alfred Russel Wallace
- :The Malay Archipelago describes eight years exploring Indonesia and other islands
- Henry Walter Bates
- :The Naturalist on the River Amazons describes 11 years in the Amazon rainforest
- Mary Anne Barker
- :Station Life in New Zealand
- :A Year’s Housekeeping in South Africa
- Isabella Bird published more than a dozen books on her global travels, including:
- :The Englishwoman in America
- :The Hawaiian Archipelago
- :The Golden Chersonese and the Way Thither
- :Korea and her Neighbours
- :The Yangtze Valley and Beyond
- Fran Levstik
- :Popotovanje od Litije do Cateža a journey from Litija to Catež that includes a very influential Slovenian literary programme.
- Ármin Vámbéry
- :His Life and Adventrures
- William Morris
- :Icelandic Journals
- Mark Twain
- :The Innocents Abroad
- :Roughing It
- :A Tramp Abroad
- :Following the Equator
- Harriet Beecher Stowe
- :Palmetto Leaves
- John Burroughs
- :Fresh Fields
- William Dean Howells
- :Certain Delightful English Towns
- Henry James
- :A Little Tour in France
- :English Hours
- :The American Scene
- :Italian Hours
- Joshua Slocum
- :Sailing Alone Around the World
- Robert Louis Stevenson
- :An Inland Voyage
- :Travels with a Donkey in the Cévennes
- :The Silverado Squatters
- Sir Martin Conway Aconcagua and Tierra Del Fuego: A Book of Climbing, Travel and Exploration
- Theodore Roosevelt
- :Ranch Life and the Hunting Trail
- :Through the Brazilian Wilderness
- Pandita Ramabai
- :Pandita Ramabai's American Encounter: The Peoples of the United States
- Rabindranath Tagore
- :Europe Jatrir Diary
- :Japan Jatri
- :Russiar Chithi or Rashiar Chithi
- :Parashya Jatri
- Prince Bojidar Karageorgevitch
- :Enchanted India
- Mary Kingsley
- :Travels in West Africa
- J. Smeaton Chase
- :Yosemite Trails
- :California Coast Trails
- :California Desert Trails
- Nellie Bly
- :Around the World in Seventy-Two Days
- Georges Clemenceau, French Prime Minister and WWI leader
- : Au Pied du Sinaï. Travels in Jewish Europe down to Palestine
- Edward Ermatinger
- : Edward Ermatinger's York Factory Express Journal: being a record of journeys made between Fort Vancouver and Hudson Bay in the years 1827-1828
20th century
- Nagai Kafu American Stories, modern ed., Columbia University Press, 2000.
- Octave Mirbeau
- :La 628-E8
- Jelena Dimitrijevic
- :Letters from Niš Regarding Harems
- :Letters from Salonica on Young Turk Revolution
- :Letters from India
- :Letters from Egypt
- :The New World, alias: In America for a Year
- Ernest Shackleton
- :South
- Edith Wharton
- :In Morocco
- Daisy Bates
- :
- :
- Ekai Kawaguchi Three Years in Tibet
- Carl Gustaf Emil Mannerheim
- :Across Asia from West to East in 1906-1908 explorations by Czarist spy who would later become President of Finland.
- Norman Douglas
- :Old Calabria
- Laura Ingalls Wilder
- :On the Way Home
- :West from Home
- :A Little House Traveler
- Gertrude Bell
- :Persian Pictures
- :Syria: The Desert and the Sown
- Felix Salten
- :Neue Menschen auf alter Erde: Eine Palästinafahrt
- :Fünf Minuten Amerika
- André Gide
- :Amyntas
- :Voyage au Congo –
- :Le retour de Tchad
- :Retour de l'U. R. S. S.
- :Retouches â mon retour de l'U. R. S. S
- Ernest Peixotto
- :Our Hispanic Southwest contains the first usage of the ethnic slur "spic"
- Hilaire Belloc
- :The Path To Rome a ramble by foot from central France to Rome in 1901.
- W. Somerset Maugham
- :On a Chinese Screen vignettes of China from the master of the short story.
- Yone Noguchi
- :The American Diary of a Japanese Girl
- Jack London
- :The Cruise of the Snark
- Isidora Sekulic
- :Pisma iz Norveške / Letters from Norway
- D. H. Lawrence
- :Sea and Sardinia
- Isak Dinesen
- :Out of Africa
- Alma Karlin
- :'
- :Urok Južnega morja / Im Banne der Sudsee
- :Mistika Južnega morja, I. del Polinezija, II. del Melanezija-Mikronezija / Mistic of the South Sea; Polynesia, Melanesia- Micronesia
- :Malik
- :'
- :'
- :Nabobova stranska žena / Nabob's side wife
- :Mala Siamka / Little Siamese
- :'
- :'
- :Kot ujetnica pri lovcih na glavo na Novi Gvineji / As a prisoner among the head hunters in New Guinea
- :Samotno potovanje / Einsame Weltreise
- :a Slovene anthropologist who spoke 12 world languages published 24 books and over 40 literary works between 1921 and 1937 from her travels in China, Japan, Papua New Guinea, India, Polynesia, Micronesia, Australia, Peru.
- Henry Vollam Morton
- :The Heart of London
- :In Search of England
- Frederick O'Brien
- :White Shadows in the South Seas
- :Mystic Isles of the South Seas
- :Atolls of the Sun
- :Black Lamb and Grey Falcon an 1,181-page look at Yugoslavia before World War II.
- Freya Stark
- :The Valleys of the Assassins
- :The Southern Gates of Arabia: A Journey in the Hadhramaut
- :Seen In The Hadhramaut
- :A Winter in Arabia
- :Ionia a Quest
- :The Lycian Shore
- :Alexander's Path
- :Riding to the Tigris.
- Mahapandit Rahul Sankrityayan
- :Volga Se Ganga
- Thomas Raucat
- :L'honorable partie de campagne
- :De Shang-Haï à Canton
- Amelia Earhart
- :20 Hrs., 40 Min.
- :Last Flight
- J. Slauerhoff
- :Alleen de havens zijn ons trouw
- Peter Aufschnaiter
- :Eight Years in Tibet
- Ernest Hemingway
- :A Moveable Feast
- Emily Kimbrough writer of travel humor
- :And a Right Good Crew
- Gordon Sinclair
- :Khyber Caravan: Through Kashmir, Waziristan, Afghanistan, Baluchistan and Northern India a somewhat curmudgeonly account of 1934 travels in British India by a later famous Canadian journalist and television personality.
- Richard Halliburton, one of the most famous explorers and adventure writers of his generation
- :The Royal Road to Romance
- :The Glorious Adventure
- :New Worlds to Conquer
- :The Flying Carpet
- :Seven League Boots
- Pearl S. Buck awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature, 1938.
- :My Several Worlds
- :A Bridge For Passing
- :The People of Japan
- :China as I See It
- Vivienne de Watteville
- :Out in the Blue
- :Speak to the Earth: Wanderings and Reflections among Elephants and Mountains.
- John Steinbeck
- :A Russian Journal A trip through Russia, Ukraine and Georgia in the Soviet Union shortly after World War II with the friend and renowned war photographer Robert Capa.
- :' an American road book describing Steinbeck's journeys with his poodle, Charley.
- Charles Lindbergh
- :"WE"
- :The Spirit of St. Louis
- Chiang Yee
- :The Silent Traveller series 11 books about his travels in Britain, the USA and Japan
- Ella Maillart – Swiss travel writer. Turkestan Solo - One Woman's Expedition from the Tien Shan to the Kizil Kum The Cruel Way The Land of the Sherpas
- Evelyn Waugh
- :Waugh Abroad: Collected Travel Writing an account of the English novelist's restless wanderings around the world in the 1930s and later.
- :Ninety-Two Days: Travels in Guiana and Brazil
- J.M. Synge
- :The Aran Islands, with illustrations by Jack B. Yeats.
- :Travels in Wicklow, West Kerry and Connemara, with illustrations by Jack B. Yeats.
- Graham Greene
- :Journey Without Maps
- Gerald Brenan
- :The Spanish Labyrinth
- :The Face of Spain
- Robert Byron
- :The Road to Oxiana travels in Persia and Afghanistan
- Laurens van der Post
- :The Lost World of the Kalahari Auberon Waugh described van der Post as the person in whose company he'd most like to spend an evening. This book by the South African soldier/explorer/writer suggests why.
- James Michener
- :Iberia: Spanish Travels and Reflections
- Robert A. Heinlein
- :Tramp Royale
- Peter Fleming – British adventurer and travel writer
- :One's Company: A Journey to China in 1933 — Travels through the USSR, Manchuria and China.
- :News from Tartary: A Journey from Peking to Kashmir — Journey from Peking to Srinagar via Sinkiang. He was accompanied on this journey by Ella Maillart. Later reissued as half of Travels in Tartary.
- Ian Fleming – British writer and spy. Brother of Peter Fleming.
- :Thrilling Cities
- M. F. K. Fisher
- :How to Cook a Wolf
- :Map of Another Town: A Memoir of Provence
- :Dubious Honors
- :Long Ago in France: The Years in Dijon
- Martha Gellhorn
- :Travels with Myself and Another: A Memoir
- Paul Bowles
- :Yallah
- :Their Heads Are Green and Their Hands Are Blue
- Wilfred Thesiger
- :Arabian Sands
- :The Marsh Arabs
- Gavin Young
- :Return to the Marshes
- :Iraq: Land of Two Rivers
- :Slow Boats to China
- :Halfway Around the World: An Improbable Journey
- :Slow Boats Home
- Lawrence Durrell
- :Prospero's Cell: A Guide to the Landscape and Manners of the Island of Corcyra this text describes Durrell's time in Corfu. It should be read in tandem with his brother Gerald's My Family and Other Animals.
- :Reflections on a Marine Venus experiences in Rhodes.
- :Bitter Lemons travels in Cyprus.
- Fosco Maraini Secret Tibet Meeting with Japan
- Heinrich Harrer
- :Seven Years in Tibet Ladakh: Gods and Mortals Behind the Himalayas Return to Tibet
- Gavin Maxwell
- :People of the Reeds
- Patrick Leigh Fermor
- :'
- :Roumeli: Travels in Northern Greece
- :A Time Of Gifts Covers the first part of Fermor's journey from Rotterdam to Constantinople as a 19-year-old in 1933-34. Rewritten in old age from memory, covering the Netherlands to Hungary.
- :Between the Woods and the Water The second part of the journey begun in A Time of Gifts, covering Hungary to Romania.
- :Three Letters from the Andes
- :The Broken Road The third part of the journey narrated in A Time of Gifts and Between the Woods and the Water, covering Romania to Thrace.
- Camilo José Cela
- :Viaje a la Alcarria
- Mary Lee Settle
- :Turkish Reflections: A Biography of Place
- Eric Newby, popular English travel writer
- :A Short Walk in the Hindu Kush
- :Slowly Down the Ganges
- :On the Shores of the Mediterranean
- Lucjan Wolanowski
- :Post to Never-Never Land reports from Australia.
- :Heat and fever reports from the work in World Health Organization Information department in Geneva, travels in New Delhi, Bangkok and Manila, 1967-1968.
- Jože Javoršek
- :Indija Koromandija, a travelogue through India by one of the most important Slovenian essayists of the 20th century
- Zulfikar "Zuko" Džumhur was a Bosnian writer, painter and caricaturist. He wrote screenplays and hosted TV show Hodoljublje, a travel documentary. He successfully produced this show for over ten years for television TV Sarajevo.
- :Hodoljublja
- :Nekrolog jednoj caršiji
- :Pisma iz Azije
- :Pisma iz Afrike i Evrope
- :Stogodišnje price
- :Putovanje bijelom Ladom
- :Adakale
- :Zelena coja Montenegra
- Jack Kerouac - American novelist, poet of French-Canadian descent
- :On the Road
- Truman Capote – American writer, screenwriter and reporter
- : Local Color
- : The Muses Are Heard
- Gerald Durrell
- :My Family and Other Animals a description of an idyllic childhood on Corfu in the 1930s by the brother of Lawrence Durrell. This text combines natural observations, humour, storytelling, and travel.
- :Fillets of Plaice
- Jan Morris author of many works, especially about cities; prior to the 1970s, her work was published under her previous name, "James Morris."
- :Coast to Coast
- :Oxford
- :The Matter of Wales
- :The World
- :Trieste and the Meaning of Nowhere
- Peter Matthiessen – American novelist, naturalist and founder of The Paris Review.
- :Under the Mountain Wall: A Chronicle of Two Seasons in the Stone Age
- :The Snow Leopard
- :East of Lo Monthang: In the Land of Mustang
- Jean Baudrillard
- :"America"
- Che Guevara
- :The Motorcycle Diaries Traces the 8000 km trip through South America of Marxist revolutionary Ernesto 'Che' Guevara, then a 23-year-old medical student, and his friend Alberto Granado a 29-year-old biochemist.
- Primož Kozak
- :Peter Klepec in America, a travelogue through the United States by one of the most important Slovenian essayists of the 20th century
- Juan Goytisolo
- :Campos de Nijar
- Ted Simon
- :Jupiter's Travels
- Ryszard Kapuscinski
- :Another Day of Life
- :The Soccer War
- :The Emperor: Downfall of an Autocrat
- :Shah of Shahs
- :Imperium
- :The Shadow of the Sun
- Cees Nooteboom, Dutch travel writer
- :Berlijnse Notities
- :Roads to Santiago
- :Nootebooms Hotel
- Barbara Grizzuti Harrison
- :Italian Days
- David Lodge
- :Paradise News, 1991
- Hunter S. Thompson
- :Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas
- :The Curse of Lono
- Venedict Yerofeyev
- :Moskva-P?tushki a Russian tale of alcohol, love, and a train ride; translated into English as Moscow to the End of the Line.
- William Least Heat-Moon
- :Blue Highways: A Journey into America
- Peter Mayle
- :A Year in Provence
- Colin Thubron
- :Mirror to Damascus Among the Russians Behind the Wall: A Journey through China
- :To a Mountain in Tibet
- Bruce Chatwin
- :In Patagonia Travels in Patagonia in the early 1970s.
- :The Songlines Travels in the outback of Australia in the early 1980s.
- :What Am I Doing Here Collected short travelogues and articles.
- Frances Mayes
- :Under the Tuscan Sun a memoir of buying, renovating, and living in an abandoned villa in rural Tuscany in Italy.
- Paul Theroux – prolific travel writer; author of nearly two dozen books of travel writing.
- :The Great Railway Bazaar Theroux's most popular travel work.
- :The Old Patagonian Express
- :Travelling The World - The Illustrated Travels of Paul Theroux
- :The Happy Isles of Oceania
- :The Pillars of Hercules
- :Fresh Air Fiend
- :Dark Star Safari
- :Ghost Train to the Eastern Star
- :The Tao of Travel
- Werner Herzog – German film director Of Walking in Ice – Account of a three-week walk from Munich to Paris in the Winter of 1974
- Jonathan Raban
- :'
- Michael Crichton
- :Travels
- Gao Xingjian
- :Soul Mountain
- Mary Morris
- :Nothing to Declare: Memoirs of a Woman Traveling Alone
- :Wall to Wall: from Beijing to Berlin by Rail
- :Angels & Aliens: A Journey West
- :The River Queen
- P.J. O'Rourke
- :Holidays in Hell
- :Driving Like Crazy
- :Holidays in Heck
- Claude Lévi-Strauss
- :Tristes Tropiques
- Robin Bryans
- :Ulster: A Journey Through the Six Counties
21st century
- Larry McMurtry
- : Roads: Driving America's Great Highways
- : Paradise
- James M. McPherson
- :Hallowed Ground: A Walk at Gettysburg
- Michael Palin
- :Around the World In 80 Days Sahara Himalaya
- Tom Miller
- :Best Travel Writing 2005, introduction, pp. xvii-xxi,
- :A Sense of Place: Great Travel Writers Talk About Their Craft, Lives, and Inspiration, pp. 325–343.
- :Writing on the Edge: A Borderlands Reader,
- :Travelers' Tales Cuba,
- :Jack Ruby's Kitchen Sink: Offbeat Travels Through America's Southwest
- :Trading With the Enemy: A Yankee Travels Through Castro's Cuba
- :The Panama Hat Trail: A Journey From South America
- :Arizona: The Land and the People,
- :On the Border: Portraits of America's Southwestern Frontier
- Mikiro Sasaki, Japanese poet and travel essayist
- :Ajia kaido kiko: umi wa toshi de aru '
- Lawrence Millman
- :An Evening Among Headhunters: And Other Reports from Roads Less Taken
- :Last Places: A Journey in the North
- :Northern Latitudes
- :Lost in the Arctic: Explorations on the Edge
- Nick Tosches
- :The Last Opium Den
- Chris Stewart
- :Driving Over Lemons: An Optimist in Andalucia
- :A Parrot in the Pepper Tree
- :The Almond Blossom Appreciation Society
- Bill Bryson
- :'
- :'
- :Notes from a Small Island travels in the United Kingdom.
- :A Walk in the Woods: Rediscovering America on the Appalachian Trail
- :Down Under
- :Bill Bryson's African Diary
- :'
- Douglas Adams
- :Last Chance to See
- Vikram Seth
- :From Heaven Lake: Travels Through Sinkiang and Tibet
- Quim Monzó
- :Guadalajara
- :Barcelona und andere Erzählungen
- Neil Peart, drummer for the Canadian rock band Rush
- :'
- :' – a chronicle of motorcycle trips through North and Central America
- :Traveling Music: The Soundtrack of My Life and Times
- Kenn Kaufman
- :Kingbird Highway: The Story of a Natural Obsession That Got a Little Out of Hand
- Rory MacLean
- :Stalin’s Nose
- :The Oatmeal Ark
- :Under the Dragon
- :Next Exit Magic Kingdom
- :Falling for Icarus
- :Magic Bus
- Colm Tóibín
- :Homage to Barcelona
- Christopher Paul Baker
- :Mi Moto Fidel: Motorcycling Through Castro's Cuba – winner of the Lowell Thomas Award 'Travel Book of the Year' and North American Travel Journalist Association 'Grand Prize'
- Dennison Berwick
- :Savages, The Life and Killing of the Yanomami
- :Amazon
- :A Walk Along the Ganges
- Anthony Bourdain
- :A Cook's Tour
- Pico Iyer Video Night in Kathmandu Falling off the Map: Some Lonely Places of the World Sun after Dark: Flights into the Foreign
- Geoff Dyer Yoga for People Who Can't Be Bothered to Do It ; White Sands: Experiences from the Outside World '
- Tony Horwitz
- :One for the Road: An Outback Adventure
- :Baghdad without a Map and Other Misadventures in Arabia
- :Confederates in the Attic: Dispatches from the Unfinished Civil War
- :Blue Latitudes: Boldly Going Where Captain Cook Has Gone Before
- :A Voyage Long and Strange: Rediscovering the New World
- Rebecca Solnit
- :Wanderlust: A History of Walking
- :A Field Guide to Getting Lost
- :Infinite City: A San Francisco Atlas
- Chuck Palahniuk
- :'
- Jeffrey Tayler
- :Siberian Dawn: A Journey Across the New Russia
- :Facing the Congo: A Modern-Day Journey into the Heart of Darkness
- :Glory in a Camel's Eye: Trekking Through the Moroccan Sahara
- :Angry Wind: Through Muslim Black Africa by Truck, Bus, Boat, and Camel
- :River of No Reprieve: Descending Siberia's Waterway of Exile, Death, and Destiny
- Karl Taro Greenfeld
- :Speed Tribes: Days and Nights with Japan's Next Generation
- William Dalrymple
- :In Xanadu: A Quest
- :From the Holy Mountain
- Jay Griffiths
- :Wild
- Tahir Shah
- :Beyond the Devil's Teeth
- :Sorcerer's Apprentice
- :Trail of Feathers
- :In Search of King Solomon's Mines
- :House of the Tiger King
- :The Caliph's House
- :In Arabian Nights
- :Travels With Myself: Collected Work
- :Timbuctoo
- Guy Delisle
- :'
- :'
- :Burma Chronicles
- :'
- Cheryl Strayed
- :'
- J. Maarten Troost
- :The Sex Lives of Cannibals: Adrift in the Equatorial Pacific
- :Getting Stoned with Savages: A Trip Through the Islands of Fiji and Vanuatu
- Elizabeth Gilbert
- :Eat, Pray, Love: One Woman's Search for Everything, Across Italy, India and Indonesia
- Bishwanath Ghosh
- :Chai, Chai: Travels in Places Where You Stop But Never Get Off
- Kira Salak
- :The Cruelest Journey: 600 Miles to Timbuktu
- Tom Bissell
- :Chasing the Sea: Lost Among the Ghosts of Empire in Central Asia
- Vyacheslav Krasko
- :The Year of Spring: The Travel What Lasts a Year