On International Women’s Day (Saturday 8 March 2008) Wanderlust magazine, the bible for independently minded travellers, is launching its homage to intrepid females in the form of its new ‘Girls Guide to Travel’ and a hunt for the ‘Greatest Globe Trotting Girls of all time’.

The aim is to arm more women with top tips for safe solo travel and also acknowledge the unsung female adventurers of the past. For example, while Lawrence of Arabia is a household name, few know the equally adventurous Gertrude Bell, who explored Arabia by camel in the 1890s and – alongside Lawrence – shaped the boundaries of modern Iraq after World War 1.

Log on to www.wanderlust.co.uk to download a copy of the free guide and have your say on who should be crowned queen of travel.

Wanderlust’s editor-in-chief, Lyn Hughes explains, “The typical adventure traveller today is a woman – in fact 55% of our readers are female and 67% of them have taken a solo trip in the last year. We want to applaud this on International Women’s Day and also encourage more girls to get out there and travel safely with our ‘Girls Guide to Travel’. At the same time, we wanted to recognise some of the great female travellers, which is why we are calling for people to vote in our on-line poll and celebrate the heroines of travel.”

Top Tips For Female Travellers
There is no doubt that women have an appetite for real adventure travel, but they can also be vulnerable when travelling alone. Wanderlust’s ‘Girls Guide’ offers some great tips for staying safe and getting more from your travels. For example:

• Tampons make great fire-lighting tinder – dunk them in Vaseline and they burn longer.
• Camomile teabags can help calm sunburn and make a relaxing bath infusion.
• Learn from a local – find a friend at the other end. Your Safe Planet has a global network of trusted locals providing advice on how to travel safely (www.yoursafeplanet.com).
• Consider using a ‘Mooncup’ if your are travelling during ‘the time of the month’ – a reusable rubber menstrual cup – it’s more environmentally friendly particularly good for expeditions.
• Take plenty of insect repellent –there is actually scientific evidence that generally mosquitoes bite women in preference to men! Moreover, talkative women get bitten the most. Consider proofing favourite travel clothes with permethrin’.
• Pack a large, light scarf or shawl – this can be useful for covering bare heads and shoulders in churches and mosques’.
• Pack bicarbonate of soda – useful for treating urinary tract infections’

The guide recommends websites to log on to before you head off on your travels, including www.girlstravelclub.co.uk and outlines some essential travel kit to invest in such as the shewee, a gadget that allows women to pee standing up!

It also contains amusing tips from travellers of the past – such as Mary Kingsley’s (1862-1900) advice to always travel “in a good thick skirt”.

Who Was The Greatest Female Traveller Of All Time?
Interestingly, despite the increasing trend for women to travel alone, there isn’t one female author in Amazon’s top 30 best-selling travel narratives - where are the female Palins and Brysons?

Wanderlust has posted ten biographies of female travellers who it believes deserve recognition and is asking people to vote for their favourite – or nominate their own heroine of travel. The results will be announced in the June issue of the magazine and on the website.

The shortlist includes Lady Mary Wortley Montagu who is best remembered for her ‘Turkish Embassy letters’, a series of lively accounts of life in Istanbul in 1717, and Gertrude Bell who mapped Anatolian ruins and was partly responsible for setting out the boundaries of modern Iraq in the early 1900s.

Also featured is Freya Stark, travel writer and expeditionary in the early 20th century who one of the first Western women to travel through the Arabia deserts, often solo into areas where few Europeans, let alone women, had ever been.

A few more recent travellers on the list are Dervla Murphy, author of countless travel memoirs, including ‘Eight feet in the Andes’ and ‘Through Siberia by accident’ and yachtswoman Ellen MacArthur, who broke the world record in 2005 as the fastest solo circumnavigation of the globe, in her boat Kingfisher. Other nominees include Isabella Bird, Alexandria David-Neel, Mary Henrietta Kingsley, Amelia Earhart and Jan Morris.

Lyn comments, “We know that women have been intrepid travellers through the ages but for whatever reason they don’t seem to have achieved the recognition of their male counterparts. We have unearthed some fascinating women who have broken travel boundaries and done great things, and we want to celebrate them.”

The ‘Girls Guide to Travel’ is downloadable from www.wanderlust.co.uk and greatest female traveller poll will also be posted on the site from the 8 March 2008. It will be possible for anyone to vote in the poll until 8 April 2008. The results will be released in the June issue of Wanderlust, on sale 22 May priced £3.80.

International Women’s Day: 8 March 2008

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