| ||||||||||||||||||
 Trade In this Item for up to £3.40
Get an extra £5 when you trade in books worth £10 or more until June 30, 2012. Trade in One Man Caravan (Incredible Journeys Books) for an Amazon.co.uk gift card of up to £3.40, which you can then spend on millions of items across the site. Trade-in values may vary (terms apply). Find more products eligible for trade-in.
|
Frequently Bought Together
Product details
|
More About the Author
Product Description
Product Description
Robert Fulton's legendary journey began in 1932 when he set out on his Douglas twin motorcycle for an eighteen-month odyssey that included Turkey, Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, India, Sumatra, Malaysia, Siam, Indonesia, China, and Japan -- challenging destinations that, even today, would give pause to the most world-weary traveller. His customised bike had an extra large fuel tank, a secret hiding place for his .32 revolver, and enough room in his luggage for a motion-picture camera and 40,000 feet of film. His entertaining, detailed story tells of falling from a bridge in Turkey, being held up by hundreds of robbers in Waziristan, put in jail as a smuggler in Indonesia, and being escorted across Japan by 33 motorcycles. You will discover a fascinating part of our world that's been lost forever.
Tags Customers Associate with This Product(What's this?)Click on a tag to find related items, discussions, and people.
|
Sell a Digital Version of This Book in the Kindle Store
If you are a publisher or author and hold the digital rights to a book, you can sell a digital version of it in our Kindle Store.
Learn more
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
40 of 40 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
"One Man Caravan" is a story very much like adventure travelogues I used to read as a kid.
In 1932, a young man of maybe limited resources, but unlimited resourcefulness and "chutzpah", saddles up his motorcycle and travels around the world in 18 months. En route, he encounters exotic locals and locales, battles bad roads, breakdowns, injuries, officials and wanders into hot zones of civil wars - such as the British fighting some rebels in fictitiously-sounding Baluchistan.
This would be quite typical travel adventure fare, except that it really happened. The author is Robert Fulton (later known to Cold War afficionados as the inventor of CIA/Navy Skyhook recovery system), grandson of steam-ship builder Fulton. In 1996 (re-publication time of the book) he was alive and riding his motorcycle at age of 87.
Well-written and spell-binding, particularly in light of its authenticity.
14 of 14 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
It is perhaps the worst possible way to review a book by commencing with a strong recommendation. So I shall contain myself.
One Man Caravan is an account of an observant and highly intelligent young man as he travels around the globe on a Douglas motorcycle. And that globe was a very different planet in 1932. Few books were written of such exploits during that era and still less stood the test of time. The main reasons were that this pre dates the affluent era and mass education . But Robert Edison Fulton Jr was different. Not only was he "well born", he was restless, enquiring and cerebral.
Having studied at the universities of Harvard and Vienna his father suggested he might like to see a little of the world. As the grandson of the inventor of the Fulton Steam Boat and son of the President of Mack Trucks, he had the option of seeing the world in the common fashion of the idle rich of the 1930's, but turned his back on luxury for the taste of reality thereby measuring up to the saying :-
" one measure of a man is what he does with his time when he has nothing to do".
A glib remark at a London dinner party attended by someone who claimed to "have" the Douglas motor works brought forth the offer of a motorcycle in the terms "...how about letting me furnish it ? " . And so he did.
Thus with a sun helmet, pistol and 4000 ft of film he set out to take on the world.
The compulsive text moves at a pace as Europe is dealt with in a single chapter and then into Turkey. In the darkness of the desert night he sees the lights of camel trains across the dunes. Then his sleep is interrupted by the "...squeek of ungreased wooden axles. Somewhere in the dakness a caravan had risen...." When text reads like that you need nothing more. But Fulton is a distinguished photographer and artist. The book is lavishly illustrated with 132 photographs and 62 sketches.
Fulton doesn't try to write, he writes as he sees. At the start of the journey he reveres "....the mystery of Baghdad". And the engaging Fulton soon falls into conversation with an old man whose words have a chilling resonance for today :-
" When I was a boy, England, Europe, America, they were all an unbelievable distance away. But today it is all so different. Everything is so close together. Something happens in one corner of the earth and it affects all the others. So we must change, our traditions and customs must slowly go. And it will be accomplished....East must meet West".
Fulton had a lifetime of achievement and it is small wonder that "...all who knew him regard him as a kind, wise, generous and intensely interesting man".
This book has recently been republished for a new audience and is rapidly featuring high on the inevitable " top ten of all time" lists that appear everywhere. In Fulton's case it is richly deserved.
Fulton's step son set off around the world on a modern motorcycle to recreate the trip but was killed half way round. Fulton continued to ride into his 80's and still possessed the very same Douglas motorcycle. He died in 2004 aged 95.
Buy this book and send it to your Nation's leader.
One Man Caravan is an account of an observant and highly intelligent young man as he travels around the globe on a Douglas motorcycle. And that globe was a very different planet in 1932. Few books were written of such exploits during that era and still less stood the test of time. The main reasons were that this pre dates the affluent era and mass education . But Robert Edison Fulton Jr was different. Not only was he "well born", he was restless, enquiring and cerebral.
Having studied at the universities of Harvard and Vienna his father suggested he might like to see a little of the world. As the grandson of the inventor of the Fulton Steam Boat and son of the President of Mack Trucks, he had the option of seeing the world in the common fashion of the idle rich of the 1930's, but turned his back on luxury for the taste of reality thereby measuring up to the saying :-
" one measure of a man is what he does with his time when he has nothing to do".
A glib remark at a London dinner party attended by someone who claimed to "have" the Douglas motor works brought forth the offer of a motorcycle in the terms "...how about letting me furnish it ? " . And so he did.
Thus with a sun helmet, pistol and 4000 ft of film he set out to take on the world.
The compulsive text moves at a pace as Europe is dealt with in a single chapter and then into Turkey. In the darkness of the desert night he sees the lights of camel trains across the dunes. Then his sleep is interrupted by the "...squeek of ungreased wooden axles. Somewhere in the dakness a caravan had risen...." When text reads like that you need nothing more. But Fulton is a distinguished photographer and artist. The book is lavishly illustrated with 132 photographs and 62 sketches.
Fulton doesn't try to write, he writes as he sees. At the start of the journey he reveres "....the mystery of Baghdad". And the engaging Fulton soon falls into conversation with an old man whose words have a chilling resonance for today :-
" When I was a boy, England, Europe, America, they were all an unbelievable distance away. But today it is all so different. Everything is so close together. Something happens in one corner of the earth and it affects all the others. So we must change, our traditions and customs must slowly go. And it will be accomplished....East must meet West".
Fulton had a lifetime of achievement and it is small wonder that "...all who knew him regard him as a kind, wise, generous and intensely interesting man".
This book has recently been republished for a new audience and is rapidly featuring high on the inevitable " top ten of all time" lists that appear everywhere. In Fulton's case it is richly deserved.
Fulton's step son set off around the world on a modern motorcycle to recreate the trip but was killed half way round. Fulton continued to ride into his 80's and still possessed the very same Douglas motorcycle. He died in 2004 aged 95.
Buy this book and send it to your Nation's leader.
12 of 12 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Some books really are fixed in their time, but despite being 70 years old this travel diary with its simple pen illustrations is fresh as yesterday. It has enough motorcycling in it to please bikers, but not too much to overwhelm anyone else looking for an excellent travelogue. Fulton went through several of today's trouble spots during his trip, and his observations bring home the roots of much of what is behind those troubles. Without getting at all metaphysical, the book brings out the feel of a bike trip, the connection with the land you pass through, and the disconnection a rider can feel at the end of a trip. Buy it......
Would you like to see more reviews about this item?
Were these reviews helpful?
Let us know
Most Recent Customer Reviews
Beware blythe comments
Having recently graduated, Fulton found himself at a dinner party discussing his immenent return to the US. Read more
Published 16 months ago by MarkE
One Man Caravan
Ted Simon rates this as his best motorcycle travel book. I can see why. Bike enthusiasts should bear in mind that the journey is the reason for the bike, not the other way round. Read more
Published on 12 Feb 2010 by Mr. David S. Rice
Scares the pants off me !
What a great read ! I really really want to do something like this, but you read the details and read between the lines and think "Am I really ready for that ? Read more
Published on 12 Feb 2010 by meeklum
One man caravan
Well written book about a round the world trip on a motorcycle by a particularly interresting character. Read more
Published on 8 Oct 2009 by Dai Bandit
Puts "Long Way Down/Round" in the Shade
I would disagree with FZ6 Rider. I do not think the book is exaggerated and it matters not whether he was the first to go round the world. Read more
Published on 10 July 2008 by M. Hayes
Indiana Jones on a bike
For me the book was over exaggerated and hardly proves he was the first to go around the world on a motorbike. Read more
Published on 29 Feb 2008 by Stephen Lindley
Fantastic adventure
One of the best rtw motorcycle books there is. Robert Edison Foulton jr's adventure in 1932 on a Douglas motorcycle really brings to life the world as it was then only a few years... Read more
Published on 13 Feb 2008 by Roger J. Markham
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
Listmania!
Look for similar items by category
Look for similar items by subject
Feedback
- Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
- I am the Author, and I want to comment on my book.
- I am the Publisher, and I want to comment on this book.
|
