Global travel can be a wearying business: mass tourism, overcrowded planes, chaotic airports, heightened security, cookie-cutter hotel chains, well-worn tourist trails. Finding even a sliver of adventure can sometimes feel impossible. But take heart: for all of us with an unfulfilled spirit of wanderlust,
The Golden Age of Travel
evokes an era when traveling the world was a thrilling new possibility
for those with the resources, time, imagination, and daring.
This richly illustrated volume
charts the travel heyday of 1869 to 1939
. Bedecked with ephemera and precious turn-of-the-century photochroms, it follows
six classic tours
favored by Western adventurers in the prewar era, including such famous traveler-writers as
Charles Dickens, Jules Verne, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Mark Twain, and Goethe
. From the
Grand Tour of Europe
, a traditional rite of passage for young English aristocrats, to the
Far East
, barely touched by Western influence, to the famous
Trans-Siberian Railway
, we follow each journey through its itinerant stops and various modes of transport: trains, boats, cars, planes, horses, donkeys, and camels.
With pages brimming with
archival travel posters, guides, tickets, leaflets, brochures, menus, and luggage stickers
, the book evokes all the romance, elegance, not to mention the sheer sense of novelty, that enthralled these golden-age passengers. Through decadent new cities, or wild, rugged terrains, this is your
passport to a long-lost epoch of adventure and wide-eyed wonder at the world
.