Travelogue

"Lemon trees, like Italians, seem to be happiest when they are touching one another,” wrote British novelist D.H. Lawrence in his travelogue, "Sea and Sardinia."

"Lemon trees, like Italians, seem to be happiest when they are touching one another,” wrote British novelist D.H. Lawrence in his travelogue, "Sea and Sardinia." The lemon trees are still touching, but now the unspoken rule for Italians is non toccare (no touching).

One of my ancestral lands is Greece, and I have visited this eerily non-European-looking European country with its strange architectures. I went through the sunny islands and the mainland. A favourite travelogue is The Olive Grove by Katherine Kizilos, a Greek-Australian who voyaged in the off-season. Ursula K. Le Guin's Earthsea fictional series is reminiscent of this magical land. I love the Mediterranean climate.

Another sunny day, this 1st of August of 2025, here on Lulu Island. At Tim Hortons café, whilst I was drinking oat-milk iced coffee, I was talking with Hans the Dutchman, sitting in his motorized wheelchair. He was enjoying a Boston cream donut and a peach sparkling quencher. We talked about my great-great-grandfather Dimitri, from Kimi on Evia Island, Greece. My Filipino family has an ancient sepia picture of him sitting as if he were Count Dracula. Hans told me that he has a woman cousin from Netherlands, who escaped the cold climate to live indefinitely in sunnier Greece. She's been overstaying there for 20-plus years! At home, my Greek-Cypriot neighbour George came by to give my family a big bag of cute green figs. He's married to a Japanese, Chika, and they have two hybrid daughters, Chloe and Anna. I toured the Greek mainland and islands in 2002, but never reached Kimi. I've read the travelogue, The Olive Grove: Travels in Greece, by Katherine Kizilos, a Greek-Australian, and it seems that Greece is also nice in the off-season.

During this period, and especially in Russia, the travelogue becomes a hybrid genre comprising elements of poetry, prose, and the drama.

The Road to Oxiana is a travelogue by Robert Byron, first published in 1937. It is considered by many modern travel writers to be the first example of great travel writing.