The Best American Travel Writing 2011
Page 32
SEBASTIAN COPELAND
Alone Across Greenland. Men's Journal, December/January.
JOHN D'AGATA
What Happens There. The Believer, January.
AVI DAVIS
Creatures of Other Mould. The Believer, November/December.
MARCIA DESANCTIS
Strangers on a Train. New York Times Magazine, July 16.
BILL DONAHUE
A Pilgrimage to SkyMall. World Hum, January 26.
BRIAN T. EDWARDS
Watching Shrek in Tehran. The Believer, March/April.
ETHAN EPSTEIN
Staring at North Korea. Slate, October 7.
IAN FRAZIER
On the Prison Highway. The New Yorker, August 30.
A. A. GILL
Loch, Stalk, and Burials. Vanity Fair, January.
AARON GULLEY
Shaken. Outside, October.
ERIC HANSEN
Steamed. Outside, August.
PETER HESSLER
Go West. The New Yorker, April 19.
MANNY HOWARD
Sauvage Grace. New York Times Magazine, September 26.
PICO IYER
Forever Foreign. Smithsonian, June.
Istanbul, City of the Future. National Geographic Traveler, October.
Lover's Moon. World Hum, March 15.
ROWAN JACOBSEN
Heart of Dark Chocolate. Outside, September.
The Spill Seekers. Outside, November.
MARK JENKINS
The Forgotten Road. National Geographic, May.
ALDEN JONES
The Burmese Dream Series. Post Road, vol. 19.
JOHN LANCASTER
Pakistan's Heartland Under Threat. National Geographic, July.
ANTHONY LANE
Only Mr. God Knows Why. The New Yorker, June 28.
JESSICA LEVINE
My Two Weeks as a Fellini Extra. The Southern Review, Fall.
GREG LINDSAY
Triumph of the Air Warriors. Condé Nast Traveler, February.
CHADWICK MATLIN
30 Airports in 30 Days. Slate, November 12.
ANDREW MCCARTHY
L.A. Dreamin'. National Geographic Traveler, November/December.
EMILY MEEHAN
The Humanitarian's Dilemma. Slate, June 25.
JONATHAN MILES
A Chowhound's Caribbean Cruise. Food and Wine, October.
SHANE MITCHELL
Out Islands Bahamas. Travel + Leisure, June.
J. R. MOEHRINGER
Winner Take All. Smithsonian, October.
JOYCE CAROL OATES
Going Home Again. Smithsonian, March.
ANN PATCHETT
As American as Cherry Pie. New York Times Magazine, May 19.
APRIL RABKIN
A Visit to the Shrine of Afghanistan's National Hero. Slate, September 9.
ALEXIS SCHAITKIN
Living Relics. Ecotone, Spring.
LIESL SCHILLINGER
Confessions of a Soukaholic. New York Times Magazine, May 19.
JOHN SEABROOK
The Last Babylift. The New Yorker, May 10.
DAVID SEDARIS
Standing By. The New Yorker, August 9.
ELLEN RUPPEL SHELL
Capsized. New York Times Magazine, January 24.
ROBIN SHULMAN
World Cup Travels in Post-Apartheid South Africa. Slate, July 2.
JEREMY STAHL
"It's Like a Safari and We're the Zebras." Slate, September 21.
KAYT SUKEL
Chet of Arabia. The Atlantic, March.
THOMAS SWICK
A Walk Through Old Japan. Smithsonian, October.
Venice in Three Acts. Afar, September/October.
PATRICK SYMMES
The Beautiful and the Dammed. Outside, June.
Thirty Days as a Cuban. Harper's Magazine, October.
DAMON TABOR
If It's Tuesday, It Must Be the Taliban. Outside, December.
HANNAH TENNANT-MOORE
The Sexual Lives of Sri Lankans. World Hum, December 17.
GUY TREBAY
Going Postal. Travel + Leisure, February.
CALVIN TRILLIN
No Daily Specials. The New Yorker, November 22.
Some Like It Hot. Condé Nast Traveler, November.
JOHN WASHINGTON
The Local to Mexico City. The Smart Set, October 7.
JOHN WRAY
Acquired Taste. New York Times Magazine, February 28.
Footnotes
* Several other names have been changed with this same precaution in mind.
[back]
***
* When the Turks began shelling the border—which happened on a Friday, the Muslim Sabbath, family day, hence a paid holiday for the fixer—he roared off to photograph the damage for the newspapers, having declined to invite me. Perhaps he was jealous because I had accepted the interpreter's invitation to picnic with his family beside a river with lovely frogs that quacked like birds, ladies in bright, sparkling, many-layered gauzy skirts, willowlike trees, an ancient cave-cliff tomb dating perhaps to Assyrian times and now brought up-to-date with graffiti, and lamb guts floating in the water like balloons. Shortly after I left Iraq, the fixer was caught in a suicide bombing in downtown Kirkuk. He escaped injury but was attacked afterward by an angry mob who mistook him for a Turkmen and beat him so badly the doctors later thought the metal embedded in his face was shrapnel from the explosion.
[back]