Thule | Greatest Adventurers https://www.greatestadventurers.com Free Public Domain PDF e-books about adventurers, explorers, sailors and mountaineers from all over the world – and exciting novels of adventure. Be inspired and learn how the world was discovered. Tue, 23 Feb 2021 07:51:11 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.8.5 https://www.greatestadventurers.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/cropped-logo-grøn-trans-mindre-32x32.png Thule | Greatest Adventurers https://www.greatestadventurers.com 32 32 The Voyages of the Norsemen to America https://www.greatestadventurers.com/voyages-of-norsemen/ https://www.greatestadventurers.com/voyages-of-norsemen/#respond Mon, 07 Dec 2020 11:07:58 +0000 http://greatestadventurers.com/?p=547 THE VOYAGES OF THE NORSEMEN TO AMERICA is an impressive historical presentation of the travels by the Vikings to America. The book was written by the dane William Hovgaard and published in English in 1914. His aim was to collect ... Read more and download PDF

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THE VOYAGES OF THE NORSEMEN TO AMERICA is an impressive historical presentation of the travels by the Vikings to America. The book was written by the dane William Hovgaard and published in English in 1914. His aim was to collect all the historical facts and evidences from various sources, and up to today Voyages of Norsemen is the authoritative compilation of historical descriptions of the travels of the Vikings to Iceland, Greenland and Vinland. The book is richly illustrated with maps and photos from expeditions to places where the Norsemen according to the sagas have been. William Hovgaard has many interesting points and for instance he draws similarities between popular folk games played by Norsemen in Iceland and Inuit games, and thereby supports written sources about Viking travels to remote parts of Greenland and Canada. The book goes into details of the following Viking voyages to America:

List of Viking voyages to America:

  • Bjarni’s Voyage (985 or 986)
  • Leif’s Return Voyage from Norway (1000)
  • Leif’s Voyage of Exploration to Vinland (1001)
  • Thorvald’s Voyage
  • Thorstein’s Voyage
  • Karlsefni’ s Expedition

Download the free PDF e-book here (408 pages/28MB):

 Voyages of Norsemen

The post The Voyages of the Norsemen to America first appeared on Greatest Adventurers.]]> https://www.greatestadventurers.com/voyages-of-norsemen/feed/ 0 The North West Passage by Roald Amundsen https://www.greatestadventurers.com/the-north-west-passage-by-roal-amundsen/ https://www.greatestadventurers.com/the-north-west-passage-by-roal-amundsen/#respond Fri, 28 Aug 2020 00:30:01 +0000 http://greatestadventurers.com/?p=44 The North West Passage by Roald Amundsen is the well written and sometimes dramatic story about the “Gjöa Expedition”, led by Amundsen himself during the years 1903-1907. This fine work was published after his successful return and it is richly illustrated with ... Read more and download PDF

The post The North West Passage by Roald Amundsen first appeared on Greatest Adventurers.]]> The North West Passage by Roald Amundsen is the well written and sometimes dramatic story about the “Gjöa Expedition”, led by Amundsen himself during the years 1903-1907.

This fine work was published after his successful return and it is richly illustrated with maps and high-quality photographs, considering the time. The expedition was sometimes quite dramatic, and only sheer luck separated survival from total catastrophe:

“In the pitch-dark night, which luckily was perfectly calm, a mighty flame, with thick suffocating smoke was leaping up from the engine-room skylight. A fire had broken out in the engine-room, right among the tanks holding 2,200 gallons of petroleum. We all knew what would happen if the tanks got heated: the “Gjöa” and everything on board would be blown to atoms like an exploded bomb. We all flew in frantic haste.”

The expedition was spectacular since it was the first time man navigated The North West Passage – the northern link between the Atlantic and the Pacific oceans. At the time, the passage was only partly open for short periods in the summer, making the voyage very difficult and the risk of getting stuck in ice was imminent.

Today, though, due to climate changes, the passage is increasingly open for commercial traffic and it has the potential to disrupt global sea transport.

The objective of the expedition was met, but the Norwegian Roald Amundsen was disappointed that he was not able to reach the magnetic north pole, which also was a goal of the journey.

Download The North West Passage PDF here in full length (349 pages/10MB):

The North West Passage

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