Sailing Alone Around the World

By Joshua Slocum

In 1895 Joshua Slocum boarded Spray, his trusty sloop, and traversed 46,000 miles, becoming the first person to circumnavigate the world solo. Afterward, he retired to the Vineyard. Slocum’s highly readable memoir of the voyage has since inspired sailors and other globe wanderers for more than a century.

The Voyage of the Beagle

By Charles Darwin

At the ripe age of twenty-two, Charles Darwin set out on a five-year voyage that ultimately changed the world. The resulting memoir and field journal from that journey is a classic of both travel writing and scientific observation, and a precursor to his revolutionary theory of evolution and better-known book, On the Origin of Species.

Wreck of the Whale Ship Essex

By Owen Chase

First mate Owen Chase recounts his harrowing time at sea after a sperm whale attacked and sank the Essex. The survivors spent months on the open ocean in small whaleboats and were forced to resort to cannibalism; finally, eight of them made it across the Pacific to South America. The tale inspired Herman Melville’s Moby-Dick.