Simon Raven (l) & Chris Raven (r) on the Road to Damascus, Syria.
Copyright Samosir Books
Over the past decade, UK authors and road trip travel writers, Simon Raven and Chris Raven, have carved a career in extreme overland adventure travel. Priding themselves in going it alone without the costly support crews used by Top Gear or Charley Boorman and Ewan McGregor, the brothers drove from the UK to Vladivostok in in a rusty Ford Sierra.
Amongst multiple overland expeditions, Simon and Chris successfully traversed the Trans-oceanic highway from the Pacific to the Atlantic coast of South America. Documenting this fascinating route over the Andes and through the Peruvian Amazon years before the completion of the Trans-Amazonica, their book 'Carnival Express', published in the UK by Samosir Books, was to establish the brothers as modern day explorers and pioneers of new and less explored overland routes. Regular contributors of travel articles and photography to various online publications over the years, Simon and Chris have covered endless international destinations across the globe including tribal India, China's deep south, the road to Damascus and the Balkan peninsula.
The brother’s exciting expedition to Crimea and the Caucasus sees our trusty pioneers embark on a quest to drive full circle around the Black Sea. Gripped by curiosity following the discovery that this strange inland sea is the origin of endless myths and legends including Noah’s Ark, Jason and the Argonauts and a tribe of fierce female warriors known as the Amazons, Simon and Chris fired up their twenty year old Volvo in the shadow of rising tension in Ukraine and headed east. Seizing a rare window of opportunity to drive full circle around the Black Sea, the travelling duo investigate this less explored region of the world that for decades has been impassable due to violent conflict in the Caucasus, partly caused by two wars in Chechnya, the Abkhazia conflict in Georgia and the Russo-Georgian war. Receiving conflicting reports from the Russian and Georgian consulates in London, the brothers successfully crossed this less visited frontier at the gateway of Eurasia and had the opportunity to bring this fascinating corner of Europe to life in their book ‘Black Sea Circuit’ which was launched on 4th June 2015.
Only months after completing their journey from Odessa in the Ukraine to the Danube Delta in Romania, passing through Crimea, Southern Russia’s “Wild West”, the ancient Georgian kingdom of Colchis and Turkey’s Pontic coast, this inspiring route became impassable once more as war erupted in East Ukraine following the Euromaidan protests in Kiev in early 2014. Offering a rare glimpse into a region of Europe where the ancient Greeks first established trading colonies with the nomadic steppe tribes, thousands of years before the birth of Abrahamic religions in the Levant, ‘Black Sea Circuit’ is an eye opening account of the origns of the modern world at the birthplace of civilisation.
Join the Raven brothers on four epic overland adventures across the USA, Russia, Black Sea and South America!
by The Raven Brothers
Hike, Drive, Stayin' Alive!by The Raven Brothers
On Amazon >
Out of shape and unprepared, The Raven Brothers return to the road in a collection of ten quests to travel to their dream destinations against all odds! After two decades pioneering new routes across the globe, you would expect the authors of 'Driving the Trans-Siberian' to be hotshot explorers, with a sixth sense and an ability to survive in almost any situation. Think again! With virtually zero knowledge of the workings of the internal combustion engine and very limited skills of wilderness survival, Simon and Chris struggle into their hiking boots and power across three continents by river, tarmac and trail.
Venture to the top of Norway, cruise the road to Damascus, hike the Camino trail into Spain’s Wild West, row the Ganges, explore Frida Kahlo’s world in Mexico City, hangout with the dead in Sicily’s eerie catacombs, crawl deep inside Bolivia’s notorious silver mine, seek lions in Gujarat, wellness in Berlin and journey into the Naga Hills where tribal kings still rule.
Noted by Lonely Planet for their talent to portray an “accurate view of what to expect”, 'Hike, Drive, Stayin’ Alive!' signals a return to the duo writing “buttock clenching” travel comedy with the first in a series of candid stories of adventure by The Raven Brothers.
