These Travel Books Will Take You All Around the World—For Free

The easiest way to travel without a plane ticket? Open up a book, and skip the jet lag. The best travel books offer more than a checklist of tourist attractions. Rather, they intertwine sight-seeing with self-discovery. Perhaps that's why solo travel books, like Mary Morris's All the Way to the Tigers or John Steinbeck's classic Travels With Charley, are especially effective: They're all about the effect of travel on the spirit.

These expansive reads range from scenic train trips in Kazakhstan (Around the World in 80 Trains) to romantic jaunts in Europe (Under the Tuscan Sun) to hiking treks (Wild). Vintage accounts like Freya Stark's excursion to Persia in the 1930s, or Beryl Markham's feat of aviation in 1936, capture a time when crossing an ocean was no easy task. Travel books by Black authors like Tembi Locke's Italy-set From Scratch or Overground Railroad by Candacy Taylor explore the intersection of race and voyaging. And gorgeous coffee table books from National Geographic and the New York Times will inspire constant wanderlust for everyone, whether you're a young adult looking to backpack or a retiree planning a long-awaited vacation.

These timeless travel books are as relevant in 2021 as they were when they were written, and they all have one thing in common: they'll take you on a journey and perhaps even change the way you see the world.