Beautiful words from travelers, explorers, and wanderers

"The desert, like a powerful magnet, changes those who come within its field. Many travelers have felt it to be an almost mystical experience; others, a challenge to their humanity, to their very survivability. Some have found peace, some despair. Others have created from inner resources monuments of literature, philosophy, and religion. Perhaps the desert is no more than a magnifying lens, something that enables man to write large whatever he truly is."
William B. Polk and William J. Mares

"The world is only a tolerable place because of the empty places in it--millions of people all crowded together, fighting and struggling, but behind them, somewhere, enormous, empty places. I tell you what I think," he said, "when the world's filled up, we'll have to get hold of a star. Any star. Venus, or mars. Get hold of it and leave it empty. Man needs an empty space somewhere for his spirit to rest in."
Doris Lessing 1919

"It began in mystery, and it will end in mystery, but what a savage and beautiful county lies in between."
Diane Ackerman 1948

"How hard it is to escape from places. However carefully one goes they hold you--you leave bits of yourself fluttering on the fences--little rags and shreds of your very life."
Katherine Mansfield 1888-1923

"....once you have traveled, the voyage never ends, but is played out over and over again in the quietest chambers...the mind can never break off from the journey."
Pat Conroy 1945

"....I think about all the different ways we leave people in the world. Cheerily waving goodbye to some airports, knowing we'll never see each other again. Leaving others on the side of the road, hoping that we will."
Amy Tan, 1952