Back in September, London held its annual Doors Open Event. If you refer to the entry from the 26^th of that month, you can re-cap our trip to the British Library. While we were there, we got tickets to a talk by Robin Hanbury-Tenison. The talk was on a new book just published by Thames & Hudson called the 70 great journeys in history. Given our current adventures, it seemed appropriate to go.

Thames & Hudson publish a series entitled the 70 greatest whatever. Each title explores achievements in human history. The 70 sections in the book have been written by 54 different authors. The section authors are explorers and accomplished travellers in their own right.

Robin Hanbury-Tenison is a member of the Royal Geographical Society and an accomplished traveller. He has travelled and researched all over the world. He is also an outspoken conservationist. The most arduous journey of his was the land crossing of South America at its widest point. He has also lived to lecture and write books about it.

The book does not cover the classic British fly and flop to Ibiza or a coach tour of Paris. It deals with legendary stuff. Ancient world travels like Alexander the Great and Hannibal crossing he Alps with his four elephants. Renaissance explorers like Sir Francis Drake, Cortés and Samuel de Champlain. It also covers some of my favourite modern explorers like Thor Heyerdahl and the astronauts that have been to the moon.

The talk was good. It was not great, just good. The editor, Mr Hanbury-Tenison, was quite dry in the most appropriate British sense. He did suffer from what I perceive to be insufficient preparation. There were times when he looked over his shoulder at the slides on the screen almost in surprise. That said, he came across as being passionate about the subject of exploration.

The author put forth the notion that there may be a genetic link to the desire to travel. It is not proven. It is a theory based on the distribution of this genetic peculiarity along the migratory paths of early humans. I cannot speak to the science of the human genome. In reading the book, it occurs to me that what all of the travellers have in common, from ancient Muslim Pilgrims going to Mecca to Hillary scaling Everest, is the opportunity and desire to travel. It seems like that is all you need to have your own adventures