For half a century, Cicerone has been sending walkers, climbers, cyclists and trekkers to the world's great wild places. This large-format anniversary collection celebrates that legacy with 50 original stories, one for each year of publishing, written by the authors who know those places best.

Edited by Kev Reynolds and featuring contributions from more than 40 Cicerone authors, Fifty Years of Adventure spans the full breadth of outdoor adventure, from gentle walks on the Isle of Man coast path and a secret ascent of Snowdon to climbing K2 and trekking through the Himalayas. Accompanied by outstanding photography throughout, it is as much a visual celebration of the outdoor world as it is a literary one.

• 50 adventure stories spanning the UK, Europe and the wider world, covering walking, trekking, climbing, cycling, trail running and backpacking across five decades of Cicerone publishing
• Adventures in the UK from Mark Richards, Ronald Turnbull, Terry Marsh, Paddy Dillon and Phoebe Smith, covering Glen Sligachan, the Bob Graham Round, the Pennine Way, the Lochaber Traverse and lesser-known gems such as the Howgills and Hergest Ridge
• European adventures from Kev Reynolds, Gillian Price, Brian Johnson and others range from the Aletschgletscher and the Tour of the Bernina to the GR20 in Corsica, the Pyrenees, the Danube Cycleway and the White Mountains of Crete
• Worldwide adventures by Alan Hinkes, Alex Stewart and Kev Reynolds take in Kilimanjaro, K2, the Inca Trail, the Torres del Paine Circuit, the Lunana Snowman Trek, Mount Kailash and trekking in Kyrgyzstan's Tian Shan
• Ten tales of mishaps and misadventures offer a humorous and honest insight into the realities of guidebook research, from lightning strikes and avalanches to lost saddles and rainy Dolomites

Equal parts inspiring and entertaining, charting Cicerone's journey through the years, Fifty Years of Adventure makes a perfect gift for any outdoor enthusiast — and a reminder of just how many extraordinary places are still waiting to be explored.

Author Highlight

“For fifty years, Cicerone have sought to help adventurers have a great and safe experience, be it walking, trekking, climbing, mountaineering, cycling, running or something even more intrepid. This book is an insight into those years and the adventures along the way. We hope you enjoy reading it as much as we have enjoyed making it.”

- Jonathan and Lesley Williams, authors and chairs of Cicerone 

An appreciation 

Prologue

The Cicerone story: From then to now

Fifty years: A timeline

Out there: Adventures in the UK

1 Walk on the wild side (Phoebe Smith)

2 Glen Sligachan (Terry Marsh)

3 The Lochaber Traverse (Dan Bailey)

4 Climbing Orion Direct (Mike Pescod)

5 Loch Enoch (Ronald Turnbull)

6 A truly great mountain day (Mark Richards)

7 Intake Ridge (Brian Evans)

8 Running the Bob Graham Round (Joe Williams)

9 Bivvybag (Ronald Turnbull)

10 A walk with the gulls (Aileen Evans)

11 The Bowderdale Classic (Ian Boydon)

12 Magic among the Howgills (Dennis Kelsall)

13 The Pennine Way (Paddy Dillon)

14 The Tissington Trail (Chiz Dakin)

15 The secret side of Snowdon (Rachel Crolla)

16 Hergest Ridge (Mike Dunn)

17 The Thames Path (Leigh Hatts)

Out there: Adventures in Europe

18 Signal Forbes (Kingsley Jones)

19 The Aletschgletscher (Kev Reynolds)

20 Bovški Gamsovec – a ‘lesser’ gem (Roy Clark and Justi Carey)

21 The Tour of the Bernina (Gillian Price)

22 Sentiero de Luca and Via Ferrata delle Scalette (James Rushforth)

23 Stubai honeymoon (Allan Hartley)

24 Circling the Silvretta (Kev Reynolds)

25 The Zermatt Safari (Bill O’Connor)

26 Valscura (James Rushforth)

27 The Way of St Francis (Sandy Brown)

28 The Robert Louis Stevenson Trail (Alan Castle)

29 From ocean to sea through the Pyrenees (Brian Johnson)

30 Climbing La Torrecilla (Guy Hunter-Watts)

31 Cycling through history on the Danube Cycleway (Mike Wells)

32 The White Mountains of Crete (Loraine Wilson)

33 The GR20 (Paddy Dillon)

Out there: Adventures worldwide

34 The best way to Bou Guemez (Hamish M Brown)

35 Exploring Morocco’s Anti-Atlas (Jonathan Williams)

36 To climb Kilimanjaro (Alex Stewart)

37 Sterkhorn (Jeff Williams)

38 The Jordan Trail (Tony Howard)

39 Kyrgyzstan’s Tian Shan (Madeline Williams)

40 The Leslie–Karamea Track (Grant Bourne)

41 The Three Capes Track (Rob Houghton)

42 Tippex on the summit of the Americas (Jim Ryan)

43 In search of Alpamayo (Kev Reynolds)

44 The Inca Trail (Will Janecek)

45 The Torres del Paine Circuit (Rudolf Abraham)

46 The Lunana Snowman Trek (Bart Jordans)

47 The heaven and hell of Mount Kailash (Siân Pritchard-Jones and Bob Gibbons)

48 The Manaslu Circuit (Kev Reynolds)

49 To Zanskar along the Tsarab Chu (Radek Kucharski)

50 K2 – the Savage Mountain (Alan Hinkes)

Mishaps and misadventures

Making a splash (Kev Reynolds)

Struck by lightning (Dan Bailey)

Travels in Iceland (Paddy Dillon)

Close encounter of the Germanic kind (Guy Hunter-Watts)

Rainy lessons in the Dolomites (Gillian Price)

No pain, no gain (Brian Johnson)

CD-Day (Mark Richards)

The saddle (Ian Boydon)

Horsing about in Ghorepani (Siân Pritchard-Jones and Bob Gibbons)

Avalanche (Mike Pescod)

An adventurous bunch: Contributing authors

The Cicerone team

Photo credits and captions

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