Best Books
Best Travel Books, Memoirs That Take You There
Quick answer
Read Wild by Cheryl Strayed first. A grieving, directionless woman with zero hiking experience decides to walk 1,100 miles of the Pacific Crest Trail alone — it's the modern benchmark for travel-as-transformation memoir.
The 3-book shortlist: Wild (the modern classic), A Walk in the Woods by Bill Bryson (the funny version of the same idea) and Into Thin Air by Jon Krakauer (for when you want real stakes).
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A good travel book does more than describe a place — it uses the trip as a structure for something else: grief, danger, reinvention, or just a very funny account of being underprepared. The eight picks below are grouped by what kind of journey you want to read about.
How We Chose
Every pick had to center a real journey the author actually took, with lasting critical or reader reputation. We checked every author, year and location against Wikipedia and Open Library as of October 2026.
Transformation, on foot
1. Wild by Cheryl Strayed
Reeling from her mother's death and the end of her marriage, Strayed sets out with no backpacking experience to hike over a thousand miles of the Pacific Crest Trail alone in 1995, and writes about it 17 years later.
- Who it's for: readers who want grief and physical endurance tied together.
- Where it goes: the Pacific Crest Trail, California to Oregon.
- Where to start: it's a standalone. Wild (2012).
2. A Walk in the Woods by Bill Bryson
Badly out of shape and with an equally unprepared friend, Bryson attempts to hike the entire 2,100-mile Appalachian Trail, and turns the many ways it goes wrong into comic travel writing.
- Who it's for: readers who want the funny, self-deprecating version of a long-trail memoir.
- Where it goes: the Appalachian Trail, Georgia to Maine.
- Where to start: it's a standalone. A Walk in the Woods (1998).
3. In a Sunburned Country by Bill Bryson
Bryson tours Australia — its deadly wildlife, its vast empty interior, and the oddity of a continent most of the world barely thinks about — with the same comic curiosity he brought to the Appalachian Trail.
- Who it's for: readers who want a full-country travelogue rather than a single trail or trip.
- Where it goes: Australia, coast to outback.
- Where to start: it's a standalone, published in the UK as Down Under. In a Sunburned Country (2000).
Travel as a search for something
4. Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert
After a difficult divorce, Gilbert spends a year split between Italy (food), India (prayer and meditation at an ashram) and Indonesia (balance, and a new relationship), structured around what each country gave her.
- Who it's for: readers who want travel used explicitly as a tool for personal rebuilding after a hard life event.
- Where it goes: Italy, India, Indonesia.
- Where to start: it's a standalone, adapted into a 2010 film starring Julia Roberts. Eat, Pray, Love (2006).
5. Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer
Krakauer reconstructs the real story of Christopher McCandless, a college graduate who gave away his savings, abandoned his car, and hitchhiked into the Alaskan wilderness, where he died after roughly four months alone.
- Who it's for: readers who want a true story that asks hard questions about idealism versus recklessness, without fully settling the argument.
- Where it goes: the American West, ending in the Alaskan backcountry.
- Where to start: it's a standalone. Into the Wild (1996).
Travel with real danger
6. Into Thin Air by Jon Krakauer
Krakauer, on assignment as a climbing journalist, was on Mount Everest during the 1996 disaster that killed eight climbers in a single storm, and wrote a firsthand account that also wrestles with his own role in events.
- Who it's for: readers who want a true account of a well-known mountaineering tragedy, from someone who was actually there.
- Where it goes: Mount Everest, Nepal.
- Where to start: it's a standalone. Into Thin Air (1997).
Classic road narratives
7. Travels with Charley by John Steinbeck
At 58, Steinbeck sets off on a three-month road trip around the United States in a custom camper truck with his standard poodle, Charley, trying to reacquaint himself with a country he felt he'd lost touch with.
- Who it's for: readers who want a classic American road-trip narrative from a major literary figure.
- Where it goes: a loop around the continental United States.
- Where to start: it's a standalone. Travels with Charley (1962).
8. The Motorcycle Diaries by Ernesto "Che" Guevara
Guevara's own account, written at 23, of an eight-month motorcycle trip across South America with a friend, encountering the poverty and inequality that would later shape his politics — published decades after his death.
- Who it's for: readers interested in how a formative journey shaped a major historical figure, independent of your view of his later politics.
- Where it goes: Argentina, Chile, Peru, Colombia and Venezuela.
- Where to start: it's a standalone. The Motorcycle Diaries, first published in 1993.
If you only read one from each group
- Transformation on foot: Wild.
- Search for something: Eat, Pray, Love.
- Real danger: Into Thin Air.
- Classic road trip: Travels with Charley.
Want more true stories? See our best nonfiction books list, or browse every list on our best book lists hub.
FAQ
What is the best travel book of all time?
Wild by Cheryl Strayed and Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer are two of the most commonly named modern classics. For a road-trip classic, Travels with Charley by John Steinbeck (1962) is the one most often cited.
What travel book is about a dangerous expedition?
Into Thin Air by Jon Krakauer (1997) is a firsthand account of the 1996 Mount Everest disaster, in which eight climbers died.
What travel book is funny?
Bill Bryson's A Walk in the Woods (Appalachian Trail) and In a Sunburned Country (Australia) are both known for comic, self-deprecating narration.
Is Eat, Pray, Love a true story?
Yes. It's a memoir by Elizabeth Gilbert about a year she spent traveling through Italy, India and Indonesia after a divorce, published in 2006.
What happened to Chris McCandless in Into the Wild?
Into the Wild follows the true story of Chris McCandless, who gave away his savings and hitchhiked into the Alaskan wilderness; Jon Krakauer's 1996 book reconstructs his journey and death.
Eight journeys, eight different reasons people leave home. Start with Wild, or pick the destination that calls to you.
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