# Travel Writer

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/travel-writer/93643>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [November 16, 2001, 1:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/travel-writer/93643 "2001-11-16T01:17:36Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 6\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![McStain](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/c4cdca/32.png) [@McStain](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/McStain)\
**Post date:** [November 16, 2001, 1:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/travel-writer/93643/1 "2001-11-16T01:17:36Z")

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OK. I’m sorry, I don’t have many facts.

I remember, vaguely, a story from my french teacher from several years back. It was about a rather prolific British travel writer or explorer (he had a significantly thick book of his compiled writings on him), who wrote first about mountain climbing (mostly India, I think) and then about ocean voyages. Apparently, on his last voyage, he was on the ocean with some friends who awoke one morning to find him comletely disappeared. The teacher said that, apparently, he realized that he was gettting pretty old, and so he decided to die at sea, or somesuch. Rather poetic, I guess.

I’m not desperate, or anything, but if anyone could tell me who this is, I’d appreciate it. Thanks.

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**Author:** ![pesch](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pesch/32/4925_2.png) [@pesch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pesch)\
**Post date:** [November 16, 2001, 5:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/travel-writer/93643/2 "2001-11-16T05:04:25Z")

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Can’t help with this one, but you may want to try and get this moved to Cafe Society, renamed something like “Can you identify this travel writer?” That might help.

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**Author:** ![Hemlock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/c5a1d2/32.png) [@Hemlock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hemlock)\
**Post date:** [November 16, 2001, 5:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/travel-writer/93643/3 "2001-11-16T05:09:20Z")

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Does the name Wilfred Thesiger ring a bell??? Just a wild guess.

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**Author:** ![astro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9dc877/32.png) [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)\
**Post date:** [November 16, 2001, 5:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/travel-writer/93643/4 "2001-11-16T05:25:51Z")

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I think Wilfred Thesiger is still alive.  
[http://www.kruse.co.uk/thesiger.htm](http://www.kruse.co.uk/thesiger.htm)

Amazing man!

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**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\
**Post date:** [November 16, 2001, 5:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/travel-writer/93643/5 "2001-11-16T05:40:10Z")

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Another website I found using Google says that Thesiger lives in a nursing home in London. Even if the webpages that speak of him as being still alive are out of date, it’s unlikely that he could somehow check himself out of the nursing home to go on a sea voyage to kill himself.

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**Author:** ![Hemlock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/c5a1d2/32.png) [@Hemlock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hemlock)\
**Post date:** [November 16, 2001, 6:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/travel-writer/93643/6 "2001-11-16T06:14:38Z")

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Hmmm… I’m sure if you told him there was a little Arab boy in it for him, he’d be off in the blink of an eye 🙂