As dog-lovers, we can’t help but adore this tale of the 34-state cross-country road trip that Steinbeck undertook in 1960 with his feisty standard poodle, Charley.

Twain’s sharp satirical observations were honed in this early narrative of his travels throughout Europe and the Holy Land in 1867, which he originally wrote as a series of newspaper dispatches for a San Francisco newspaper.

Unusually for a woman of her time, Edith Wharton had an “incurable passion for the road,” and she wrote several non-fiction works documenting her three decades of travel. We particularly love the story of her road trip through France with Henry James to visit the home of their literary idol, George Sand.

James loved Italy second only to his adopted home of England , and it provided the setting for many of his works of fiction as well as this book of essays that draws on his 40 years of Italian travels.

Until we have the chance to embark on an African safari ourselves, we’ll continue to savor the story of Hemingway’s month-long East African sojourn in 1933. His spare prose and telling descriptions make you feel like you’re bumping along in a Land Rover in hot pursuit of an elusive target.