ISBN 1590480414

ISBN 1590481739

Cucumber Sandwiches in the Andes, John Ure - No-one who wasn’t mad as a hatter would try to take a horse across the Andes by one of the highest passes between Chile and the Argentine. That was what John Ure was told on his way to take up his diplomatic posting with the British Embassy in Santiago in the early 1970s.

Disregarding the sceptics, the author prepared to ride across the hazardous mountains by studying accounts of those who had travelled in earlier centuries. An excellent example was the indomitable Lady Cochrane who was pursued across the Andes by Spanish troops in 1820.   John Ure provides exciting passages from these historical tales.

“Lady Cochrane rushed onto the bridge, but when in the centre the vibration became so great that she was compelled to lie down, pressing her child to her bosom, suspended over the foaming torrent below. In this perilous situation, Pedro begged of her to lie still, and as the vibration ceased, crept on hands and knees towards her ladyship, taking from her the child and imploring her to remain motionless… they happily succeeded in crossing, when the ropes being cut, the torrent was interposed between her and her pursuers.”

Armed with this historical knowledge, the Long Rider author and several comrades made their own remarkable journey. Although they did not encounter Lady Cochrane’s trembling bridge, they had problems of their own - how many mules, for example, do you need to carry 540 eggs, a storm tent and hay for six horses?

Fans of equestrian travel and Latin America will be enchanted by this delightful book .

Sir John Ure has enjoyed a diplomatic career in which he was ambassador to countries as diverse as Cuba, Brazil, and Sweden. He has written several books including In Search of the Nomads and Prince Henry the Navigator. He was chairman of the judges of the prestigious Thomas Cook/Daily Telegraph Travel Book of the Year award and is a regular contributor to both the Times Literary Supplement and the Sunday Telegraph.  Go to Barnes & Noble or Amazon.co.uk.

ISBN 1590481615

A Lady's Ride Across Spanish Honduras in 1881, Mary Lester - Few Englishmen, and still fewer women, had ridden from the Pacific port of Ampala, over  the mountains of Honduras, to the Atlantic in the late nineteenth century. Yet that is what the refined Mary Lester set out to do.

The intrepid traveller was laboring under a handicap as reliable maps were rare and what verbal advice was on offer turned out to be dubious and out of date. Yet such inconveniences did nothing to dampen the adventurous spirit of the lady who preferred to ride under the pseudonym “Maria Soltera.”

Regardless of what they called her, the people in Honduras soon leaned to respect the courage and determination of the foreign Long Rider.  “I do not fear hardship,” she told them, “as I am the daughter of an English soldier and circumstances have compelled me to depend on myself.”

Lester wasn’t making an idle boast. In excellent Spanish, she haggled over saddles, hired mules, deflated bullies and outwitted nefarious guides. She was, in a word, a fire-cracker whose combustible ride across the verdant mountains is still a tale to remember.

Thus “A Lady’s Ride Across Spanish Honduras” is a gem of a book, with its entertaining account  of Mary’s vivid, day to day life in the saddle. Yet the hardy amateur author was a keen observer who noted the exotic animal life, social customs, and political conditions of a jungle-trail-world that belonged to that simpler age.

ISBN 1590480147

ISBN 1590480708

Through Five Republics on Horseback, G. W. Ray - Many places come to mind when one thinks of the dangerous and unexplored places of the nineteenth century world. Africa and Tibet, for example, both challenged brave explorers in that previous age. Yet one continent, though often overlooked, offered all the adventure a daredevil could want. South America was still politically unstable and geographically challenging.
It was exactly for these reasons that George Whitfield Ray came sailing into Buenos Aires in 1889. A Fellow of the Royal Geographic Society, Ray was a part-time missionary and full-time adventure junky. Within a short time he had managed to acquire a job as “Official Explorer for the Bolivian Government”. Shortly thereafter he began a series of explorations and misadventures which still make for hair-raising reading.
Ray’s account of his South American travels, “Through Five Republics on Horseback”, was gathered from his years spent exploring the untouched interior, visiting unknown tribes, and making careful observations of native life in a host of countries.
Yet it was his equestrian adventures that made Ray justly famous.  On his most noted horse trip into the interior, the equestrian explorer set out to find a lost tribe of sun-worshipping natives who resided in the unexplored forests of Paraguay. The journey was so brutal that it defies belief. The horses were repeatedly attacked by vampire bats, thousands of which lived in nearby jungle caves. Then Ray and his horses were reduced to sucking dew off leaves to survive. By the time he discovered the tribe, Ray’s clothes were in rags, held together by horse hair thread. The intrepid American did eventually ride back to civilization, but not without paying a price for his boldness. He lost two toes to blood-sucking insects whose bites also caused much of the flesh on his feet to rot off.
Long considered a classic of equestrian travel, “Through Five Republics on Horseback” is amply illustrated with classic photographs, as well as drawings that Ray made during the course of his remarkable adventures.  Go to Amazon.co.uk or Barnes & Noble.

ISBN 159048035X

The time was 1925. The place, Buenos Aires, Argentina.

Standing on the threshold of equestrian travel history was a young Swiss Long Rider named Aimé Tschiffely. Next to him were his two faithful Criollo horses, Mancha and Gato. Their collective goal was to ride more than ten thousand miles from Buenos Aires to New York. No one had ever attempted such a journey. Everyone thought Tschiffely was mad.

Looking back on what would become the most famous equestrian journey of the modern age, it is difficult to believe that anyone doubted the abilities of the legendary Long Rider and his hardy horses. Yet the school teacher who became an equestrian explorer had been told he was too inexperienced, his horses too old, and the journey too difficult.

What Aimé Tschiffely was told was wrong.

This is the story of the greatest equestrian epic of the twentieth century, a journey that came about because a man and his horses refused to quit - ever! During the course of their travels Tschiffely, Mancha and Gato crossed deadly deserts, passed through jungles, traversed sky-high mountain passes - and rode on. They were assailed by vampire bats, mistaken for gods and navigated the Panama Canal - but rode on.

Nothing stopped them. No one since has rivalled their accomplishments.

Often imitated but never outdone, this timeless book remains the most beloved equestrian travel classic of all time. So saddle up for the ride of a lifetime. But beware: the story of Tschiffely's Ride has inspired five generations to take to the saddle in search of mounted adventure.   For more information, please go to Barnes & Noble or Amazon.co.uk

Tschiffely's Ritt, A. F. Tschiffely - Niemand, der sie ansah, war sich bewusst, daß dies ein Held und seine zwei Pferde waren. Stattdessen verspottete die Lokalzeitung den jungen Mann als “einen Irren, der vorhat, quer durchs Land nach New York zu reiten.” Wir schrieben das Jahr 1925. Der Ort: Buenos Aires, Argentinien.

Ein junger Weitreiter namens Aime Tschiffely war dabei, in die Geschichte des Wanderreitens einzugehen. Neben ihm seine zwei treuen Criollopferde, Mancha und Gato. Ihr unglaubliches Vorhaben bestand darin, über zehntausend Meilen von Buenos Aires nach New York zu reiten. Niemand hatte jemals solch einen Ritt versucht. Alle waren der Meinung, Tschiffely sei verrückt.

Wenn man auf dieses, nun als berühmtesten Ritt des zwanzigsten Jahrhunderts bekanntes Unterfangen, zurückblickt, kann man sich nur schwer vorstellen, dass Jemand an den Fähigkeiten des legendären Tschiffely und seiner zähen Pferde zweifelte. Aber dem Lehrer, der zum berittenen Abenteurer wurde, versicherte man, er sei zu unerfahren, seine Pferde zu alt und die Reise zu schwierig.

Was man Aime Tschiffely versicherte war falsch.

Dies ist die Geschichte des grössten berittenen Abenteuers unserer Zeit, einer Reise, die zustande kam weil ein Mann und seine Pferde sich weigerten, jemals aufzugeben. Auf ihrem Ritt überquerten Aime, Manch und Gato tödliche Wüsten, schlugen sich durch Dschungel, kletterten über Bergpässe in schwindelnder Höhe – und ritten weiter. Sie wurden von Vampirfledermäusen angegriffen, für Götter gehalten, navigierten durch den Panamakanal – und ritten weiter.

Niemand hat jemals ihre Errungenschaften underm Sattel oder auf Papier übertroffen.

ISBN 1590481801

Here is a tale of remarkable drama and supreme sacrifice, a story discovered by one of the world’s greatest writers deep in the jungles of South America.

Cunninghame Graham, a lifelong champion of the down-trodden, dedicated his literary genius to telling the forgotten story of the Guarani natives, a people converted to Christianity and then betrayed into slavery.

By the mid-1700s European Jesuit priests had converted an estimated one hundred thousand Guarani natives and used their labour to organize a vast theological empire within the borders of Portuguese Brazil. These immense Jesuit-controlled estates raised enormous herds of animals and produced valuable crops which were exported back to Europe, while maintaining schools and churches which taught arts and theology to the natives. After nearly two hundred years of mutual effort, the Guarani and Jesuits had achieved what was described as a ‘golden era’ of peace and progress.

Yet this same wealth, brought about by peaceful means, inspired the envy and resentment of the secular Europeans living in the surrounding countryside. In what would today be described as an act of ethnic cleansing, the Guarani natives were attacked by Spanish and Portuguese troops. Thousands of natives were enslaved, the missions destroyed and the Jesuits driven out.

This is the profound story of those innocents massacred in the name of political domination, written by a master-story teller, which inspired the movie “The Mission.”

For more information go to Barnes & Noble or Amazon.co.uk

ISBN 1590481496

Viaje a Caballo, William MacCann - El mundo era un lugar totalmente distinto cuando William MacCann partió de Gran BretaZa para andar a caballo en 1848.

Méjico y los Estados Unidos estaban envueltos en una sangrienta guerra de bordes. Oro fue descubierto en California, despertando la mayor estampida por oro en la historia de la humanidad, y revoluciones políticas eran fermentadas en Europa, donde una abierta revolución comenzaba en Hungría poco después de Klart Marx.

Mientras las tensiones políticas eran muy altas, el compositor alemán Richard Wagner estaba trabajando en su famosa opera “The Ring of the Nibelung”, y un colegio experimental para mujeres era fundado en Londres. Dentro de éste mundo turbulento anduvo a caballo el joven William MacCann.

Sabemos realmente poco respecto a MacCann basado en sus escritos, excepto que tenía un ojo agudo por la observación y era un explorador ecuestre por excelencia.

Habiendo partido a América del Sur al comienzo de los aZos 1840, determinó explorar Argentina extensivamente a caballo, ¡y que exploración hizo!

El libro original de MacCann abarcó el estudio de historia, literatura, política, economía , arte, filosofía y sucesos actuales. Éste volumen masivo, que documenta su jornada peculiar, combina asimismo descubrimientos geográficos, observación científica y aventura personal.

Pero fueron sus aventuras ecuestres las que son el objeto mayor de este estudio. Este científico amateur, convertido en explorador, fue un talentoso hombre a caballo cuyas agudas observaciones de las costumbres argentinas continúan muchos aZos más tarde, siendo claras como un cristal . Desde sillas de montar a arneses, métodos de entrenar y estilos de montar, MacCann tomó notas de lo que ahora es una cultura ecuestre largamente olvidada.