Real ladies do not travel - or so it was once said. This collection of women's travel writing dispels the notion by showing how there are few corners of the world that have not been visited by female travellers. There are also few difficulties, physical or emotional, real or imagined, that have not been met and usually overcome by these women. Life is never dull for these intrepid women, whether diving to the bed of the Timor Sea or reaching the summit of Annapurna. From an encounter with a snake in the Amazon jungle to shipwreck and kidnap on the Barbary Coast, there are tales of adventure, derring-do, and great danger. There are also moving accounts of unimaginable hardship, including caring for a family in an ammunition cart during the siege of Delhi and a journey through Tibet that leaves its author childless and widowed.