Travel

Angel’s stepfather has announced that he is taking the family to Greece to visit his parents. Angel, “the worrier,” has a lot on her mind. Will she survive the airplane trip? Will she be able to communicate with her grandparents who don’t speak English? In this sixth book of Delton’s popular series, Angel’s worries turn into fun adventures.

Inspired by a passage from Henry David Thoreau’s Walden, this story follows two bear friends who take different “routes” to get to the town of Fitchburg. Henry decides to walk, while his friend plans to work to earn the train fare. Each turn of the page offers a look at two different ways to reach the same goal. This book also includes information on Thoreau, his writings, and his literary friends, such as Louisa May Alcott and Ralph Waldo Emerson, whose names are used as characters.

A trip to the market is how most bakers buy the ingredients for an apple pie, but not in this book. Readers will take a delicious trip around the world to gather the finest foods. First, your students will board a steamship to Europe to gather Italian semolina and elegant French eggs. Then they’ll coast to Sri Lanka and trek deep into the rain forest for cinnamon. After hitching a ride back to England for milk, they’ll dock in Jamaica for sugarcane and parachute into a Vermont orchard to pick apples. At last they’ll head home to combine the ingredients! This how-to adventure includes a recipe for apple pie and a mouth-watering ending!

Before she was called the old Lupine Lady, she was known as Miss Rumphius. But long before that, she was simply Alice, a small girl who lived in a city by the sea. After listening to Grandfather’s stories of places near and far, Alice dreams of traveling to those places — and beyond. Grandfather tells Alice to make the world a more beautiful place as well. After many years of adventure-filled travel, she settles in a house by the sea. Students will enjoy globetrotting with Miss Rumphius and finding out just how she decorates the world.

Route 66 may be the best way to see the U.S.A., and your students are sure to get their travel kicks by reading this fictional keepsake. In 1946, ten-year-old Molly McIntire takes a road trip with her family. She collects a scrapbook of souvenirs and memories, including photos of well-known people, state postcards, national park ticket stubs, and dinner receipts. Through Molly’s backseat perspective, readers will learn that Springfield, Illinois, is not only the home of Abe Lincoln, but also the home of Cozy Dog hotdogs! Comical events, such as using a Mohave water bag to cool the car’s engine, accompany practical post-World War II realities. Readers will inevitably compare Molly’s life to their own!

When eleven-year-old Nicholas Young secretly boards Captain Cook’s ship Endeavor in Plymouth, England, he’s more than just a stowaway — he’s a runaway! To escape a violent employer and harsh father, Nick settles aboard Cook’s ship which is sailing to Australia. His secret hideaway is known only to a few seamen — bribed to keep silent. Inevitably, Nick is discovered, and he spends the rest of the journey proving he is an able-bodied seaman. Based on true accounts, Hesse carefully supports this 1768 historical novel with journal entries, real dates, and nautical terms. The seafaring setting and a plot including squalls, scurvy, slavery, and shipwreck anchor the novel’s unique characters. As the salty accounts of the trip crest, Nick learns the depth of his own character.

“Dear Diary … I’ve never been higher than Aunt Clara’s porch, or farther than Yoder’s General Store, but this week my dream is coming true. I’m finally in a big city!” So begins the story of Hannah, an Amish girl, who visits Chicago for the first time. Each day she tells her “silent friend,” her diary, about the wondrous things she sees, including skyscrapers, an aquarium, and crowds of people wearing strange clothes. Each new city experience is contrasted with an illustration of Amish life.

This tale of an Atlantic voyage from Connecticut to England is told through the journals of Sophie and her cousin Cody. Sophie joins her uncles and cousins on the trip, and their unseaworthy sailboat takes them on a journey full of unplanned stops, extended stays, and hasty departures. Packed with family secrets and allusions to Sophie’s past, this novel combines moments of anticipation and foreboding to create an intriguing plot.