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3.86 AVERAGE
3.86 AVERAGE
adventurous
funny
informative
lighthearted
reflective
relaxing
slow-paced
Slows down a lot at the end
A remarkable book by a true world traveler. This marks the beginning of her journeys.
A fascinating journey. Not too anthropological, which was reassuring. Interesting to read an account of Afghanistan before the Taliban.
adventurous
informative
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
Molto più bello di quanto la lentezza della mia lettura potrebbe far credere.
Whilst borders may have shifted and communications changed, the intrepid travels of Dervla Murphy have a blurry edge of timelessness. She inserts herself with such gusto into an adventure on her beloved bike Roz and takes us with her. I just loved how the whole account is written as "we" - her and Roz, her companion!
I can't imagine that this type of travel was ever deemed safe however with one spare blouse, one change of underwear and a gun, Murphy inhabits the pages from freezing Europe to heatstroke desert temperatures through Persia, Afghanistan, Pakistan and India. She is bitten by the travel bug and experiencing life with locals. Trusting her instincts she weaves her way through frustrations, delays, closed borders, swollen rivers and illness with apparently no thought of ever abandoning her journey. She covers incredible distances (an average 80 miles a day) and works her way out of seemingly insurmountable obstacles.
Written as a journal, I really sensed that I was trotting alongside a woman with considerable resilience and an ability to experience other lives immersively. I was quite disappointed when, having reached India, the journal just stopped! I just loved this derring-do the female way!
I can't imagine that this type of travel was ever deemed safe however with one spare blouse, one change of underwear and a gun, Murphy inhabits the pages from freezing Europe to heatstroke desert temperatures through Persia, Afghanistan, Pakistan and India. She is bitten by the travel bug and experiencing life with locals. Trusting her instincts she weaves her way through frustrations, delays, closed borders, swollen rivers and illness with apparently no thought of ever abandoning her journey. She covers incredible distances (an average 80 miles a day) and works her way out of seemingly insurmountable obstacles.
Written as a journal, I really sensed that I was trotting alongside a woman with considerable resilience and an ability to experience other lives immersively. I was quite disappointed when, having reached India, the journal just stopped! I just loved this derring-do the female way!
adventurous
informative
inspiring
slow-paced
Enjoyed certain elements of Full Tilt, particularly given its historical context and the ways of the world at the time that we were able to glean through it. I found the book was written rather confusingly in moments, requiring rereading to establish where I had got to. Moreover, I found I would've enjoyed more detail into the everyday challenges Dervla Murphy faced in her day-to-day on this journey. This memoir also read as fairly unemotional - the author is factual in her writing, so this may not appeal to memoir readers who enjoy delving deep into the emotions of their subjects. Nonetheless, interesting to learn about what was undoubtedly an incredible feat by a resilient, brave woman!
adventurous
funny
inspiring
lighthearted
fast-paced
adventurous
informative
This is one of the bicycle tour memoirs that has not aged well - while the cycling journey itself is an impressive achievement, and enjoyable to read her fond recollection of most of the people she meets, Murphy has some outspoken ideas about traveling through Soviet areas (pointing out how life isn't frequently that different or awful in ways that those in the West often describe, in 1960s Eastern Europe); and traveling through Afghanistan and insisting that women with very restricted options are happy (while not volunteering herself for such a fate, in a cringe-y unaware way). Still, she preserved through a lot of unique terrain and points out that it is not the difficulties themselves that are so hard, it is the fear of them happening that is so tough on us. Not clear whether the good outweighs the bad, but you will definitely get a sense of the road conditions for a cyclist in 1960s Eurasia.