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| Road to Damascus © The Raven Brothers |
For the past two decades UK authors, Chris and Simon Raven (aka, The Raven Brothers) have explored every nook and cranny of planet earth in their search for new routes. Quitting their jobs in London, they jetted off to Seattle and drove Highway 15 through backcountry America. They wrote about the life changing journey in their first book '
Living the Linger'. A year later, they attempted to drive from the UK to Vladivostok with their book '
Driving the Trans-Siberian', which established the duo as road trip travel writers and were recommended by Lonely Planet. The third book '
Carnival Express' led the brothers to travel the Trans-oceanic highway from the Pacific to the Atlantic Coast of South America. The true story follows the hapless heroes stumble over the Andes and through the heart of the Amazon, as they go on an epic journey to Olinda in northeast Brazil. Travelling new routes across Europe was next. After completing a journey through the Balkan peninsula, the brothers focused on their forth book '
Black Sea Circuit'. Seizing the opportunity to travel full circle around the Black Sea (six months before Russia's annexation of Crimea), they had the brain wave of crossing the notorious Caucasus frontier at the Zemo Larsi/Verkhny Lars border, three days after it opened. Their fascinating book also explores great legends from Jason and the Argonauts to a tribe of female warriors known as the Amazons. With the release of their fifth book '
Hike, Drive, Stayin' Alive!', Simon and Chris publish for the first time their ten true stories over the past fifteen years of travel. The incredible story of how they drove the road to Damascus is one of the stories in the book. During their fruitful period of photojournalism, it was 2007 and four years before the devastating Civil War. At the time Syria was safe to explore despite tensions in neighbouring Iraq. A period of relative calm in Syria, led the pioneering twins to embark on a quest to drive to the heart of the Middle East in a region of the world where civilization on the planet first began. Sampling Syrian beer at the castle of the Knights and exploring mind-blowing history with a backdrop of desert, mountains and awe-inspiring architecture, their challenging journey to Damascus was lead by curiosity to seek wisdom in one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the world.
‘Hike, Drive, Stayin’ Alive!’ by The Raven Brothers is out now! Order your copy from Amazon or your favourite book retailer worldwide.
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Hike, Drive, Stayin' Alive!by The Raven Brothers
Out of shape and unprepared, The Raven Brothers return to the road in a collection of ten quests to travel to their dream destinations against all odds! After two decades pioneering new routes across the globe, you would expect the authors of 'Driving the Trans-Siberian' to be hotshot explorers, with a sixth sense and an ability to survive in almost any situation. Think again! With virtually zero knowledge of the workings of the internal combustion engine and very limited skills of wilderness survival, Simon and Chris struggle into their hiking boots and power across three continents by river, tarmac and trail.
Venture to the top of Norway, cruise the road to Damascus, hike the Camino trail into Spain’s Wild West, row the Ganges, explore Frida Kahlo’s world in Mexico City, hangout with the dead in Sicily’s eerie catacombs, crawl deep inside Bolivia’s notorious silver mine, seek lions in Gujarat, wellness in Berlin and journey into the Naga Hills where tribal kings still rule.
Noted by Lonely Planet for their talent to portray an “accurate view of what to expect”, 'Hike, Drive, Stayin’ Alive!' signals a return to the duo writing “buttock clenching” travel comedy with the first in a series of candid stories of adventure by The Raven Brothers.
