Amazon.co.uk Review
London to Sydney in 25 countries--that's the task that Peter Moore, an Australian working in England, set himself. The catch was that he had to travel overland, no flights allowed within a budget of five thousand Australian dollars.
Because of "pure, unadulterated hippy envy" he attempts to discover the music, sex and drugs of the 60s hippy trail. The Wrong Way Home tells the story of his journey through Eastern Europe, the Middle East, Asia and Australia (check his ports of call on the map at the front of the book).
Moore writes like a young Bill Bryson with earrings and ponytail, pointing out the ironies and idiosyncrasies of his own and other cultures. Take the example of the cling-on koala he gives to a Chinese friend in Lanzhou as a token of thanks--he makes sure he removes the "Made in China" label first.
The book is peppered with cartoon-like characters that Moore meets on his journey; the Czechs with matching haircuts, the spitting Chinese, the drunken Australians. Juxtaposed with his acidic observations Moore writes movingly of his experiences in war-torn Bosnia and the visit to his grandfather's grave in Singapore. --Anna Hornsey
--This text refers to an alternate
Paperback
edition.
Product Description
When Peter Moore announced he was going to travel from London to his home in Sydney without boarding an aeroplane he was met with a resounding Why? The answer was perversity and a severe case of hippie envy - hippies had the best music, they had the best drugs, they had the best sex. But most of all, they had the best trips. Over the eight months (and twenty-five countries) that followed, Moore retraced the steps of many who had made the overland journey from London to the East circa 1967 with the knowledge that his funds were painfully inadequate and the chances of actually making it through places like the Balkans, Iran and China were, in a word, slim. THE WRONG WAY HOME is the hilarious account of this life-enhancing Grand Tour by means of bone-rattling bus rides, furnace-like trains and exorbitantly-priced taxis. Along the way, Moore took in the world's most expensive disco in Albania; the bombed out villages and military checkpoints of Croatia; the opium fields of Laos; student riots in Jakarta, and an all-night beach rave on a small island in southern Thailand. He describes the places - and the people he encountered there - with a mixture of awe, irreverence and self-deprecation. Striking a chord with all those travellers, young and old, who have stood where Moore stood, THE WRONG WAY HOME entertains and alarms those of us who love to read about off-the-beaten-track travel adventures but would never be fool enough to pack our rucksacks and go.
by Peter Moore
by Peter Moore
by Peter Moore
