On the Hippie Trail: Istanbul to Kathmandu and the Making of a Travel Writer

Popular and prolific travel guide author Steves resurrects his travel journal from 1978, when he and his friend Gene Openshaw decide to backpack along an overland trek called the Hippie Trail that became a well-worn route during the 1960s. It traces the Silk Road from Europe to Istanbul, Turkey, Iran, Afghanistan, India, and Nepal and ends in Kathmandu. Steves’s journal is condensed and finessed. The author was 23 at the time of writing and displays some of the cultural insensitivity of his age. He writes, for example, about a time he photographed a cremation ritual in India, which upset local people. Readers may see some of Steves’s assumptions throughout the book as examples of white male entitlement, whereas others may admire his candor. A highlight of the book is his raw, sensory impressions.