Description
Book Synopsis“What’s the strangest thing you’ve ever seen or experienced?” Gina and Scott Gaille have traveled to more than 100 countries, including many off-the-beaten-path places in Africa, South America, and Asia. Wherever they go, they ask this question. Everyone has a story, and some are truly extraordinary. Strange Tales of World Travel recounts 50 of these Bizarre, Mysterious, Horrible, Hilarious encounters, including: Daring Diplomat, who ate the flesh of the venomous cobra bird in the Sahara Desert Pearl Trader, who survived a fever through a harrowing "human" honey treatment in Oman Agent Ghost, who was shot and left to die in a garbage dump in Africa Death-Defying Instagrammer, who stepped on the tail of the world’s sixth most venomous snake in Australia to take a better photo Human Pet, who became a prince’s prisoner in Qatar Imperial CEO, who made a minion fly twelve hours to Paris from Abu Dhabi to buy clean underwear Gorilla Doll, who broke the rules of visiting Rwandan gorillas and got dragged up the side of a volcano Strange Tales of World Travel presents unforgettable stories that celebrate the unique character of countries around the globe—and the distinctive characters that make travel endlessly intriguing and exhilarating.
Trade Review“This book contains some of the most astonishing tales I’ve ever encountered. One after another. They make for obsessive reading.” —Tim Cahill, author of Jaguars Ripped My Flesh “The entire point of travel is to encounter the unimaginable. Gina and Scott Gaille have collected some of the most remarkable tales to ever see the light of day. A hoot to read.” —J. Maarten Troost, author of The Sex Lives of Cannibals “A fabulous new book! Two- or three-page stories, each one brings you to a different part of the world.” —Frommer’s Travel Show “Strange Tales of World Travel presents a world you will not find in glossy magazine articles, breathless blogs, or self-adulatory Instagrams ... it’s a world of adventures gone awry, ... of intimate glimpses of unimaginable wealth and unquestionable power, of close encounters with the wilder edges of human culture .... The result is a collection that is, as the book’s subtitle suggests, bizarre, mysterious, horrible, and hilarious—like travel, and life itself.” —From the Foreword by Don George, author of Lonely Planet’s How to Be a Travel Writer “Damn! I thought my book had the strangest bunch of true travel tales under the sun, but the Gailles’ collection leaves me in the dust. Maybe even obliterated in a Sahara sandstorm.” —Albert Podell, New York Times best-selling author of Around the World in 50 Years Bronze Winner in Travel Essay category - 2020 Independent Publisher Book Awards (IPPYs) Honorable Mention in Travel Book category - 2019 North American Travel Journalists Association (NATJA) Awards Finalist in Travel category - 2019 Foreword Magazine INDIES Book Awards
Table of ContentsForeword by Don George 1. Shark Repellent, Bora Bora 2. Cobra Bird, Sahara Desert 3. Contagions, Botswana 4. Honey of Man, Oman 5. Beware of Road Surprises, Emirate of Sharjah 6. Feeding Frenzy, Galápagos Islands 7. No Snake Dies Before Midnight, Kangaroo Island 8. The Emperor Has No Underwear, United Arab Emirates 9. Road Warrior, Nigeria 10. Agent Ghost, Somewhere in Africa 11. Here, Little Birdie, Kenya 12. The Human Pet, Qatar 13. That’s Not a Rubber Ducky, Equatorial Guinea 14. Great White Shark Buffet, Southern Ocean 15. UFOs, South America and Caribbean Sea 16. Shere Khan, India 17. The Fourth Girlfriend, Lithuania 18. The Dying Giraffe, South Africa 19. Smooth Air Decree, Oman 20. Evicted, Angola 21. The Floating Islands, Peru 22. The First Hmong Lawyer in Laos, Laos 23. A Pug in Peril, Saudi Arabia 24. The Accidental Masseur, Madagascar 25. Hello, Mr. Bin Laden, Pakistan 26. Prehistoric Forest, Seychelles Islands 27. Too Close for Comfort, Rwanda 28. Lord of the Flies, British Virgin Islands 29. Digging Your Own Grave, Mauritania 30. Bush Meat, Cameroon 31. The Cat in the Hat, Kangaroo Island 32. Dr. Ebola, Central Africa 33. One Person’s Pet Is Another’s...Dinner, Ecuador 34. Be Careful What You Admire, Emirate of Abu Dhabi 35. The Red Carpet Isn’t for Me, Gabon 36. The Askari, Tanzania 37. The Polar Bear, Arctic Ocean 38. Tsetse Fly Food, Serengeti Plains 39. The Concierge, South Australia 40. Valley of Mole Rats, The Rift Valley 41. The Real Equator, Ecuador 42. The Land of Hospitality, Japan 43. The Home of Vodun, Togo 44. The Hidden People, Iceland 45. Sea of Scooters, Vietnam 46. Road Kill Art, Australia 47. Don’t Mess with the Cape Buffalo, Malawi 48. The Tanzanite Miner, Mount Kilimanjaro 49. The Elephant Graveyard, Ngorongoro Crater 50. Mayan God, Guatemala Acknowledgments About the Authors
