The Adventures of Isabella L. Bird, a True Explorer

Isabella L. Bird is known as one of the great women writers of all time, many of her books are in the top 500 great books written by women. She was born in 1831 and lived until 1904. She was known for being an avid traveler, and a rather feisty Victorian woman. She was born in Boroughbridge, Yorkshire. Her father pastured many churches in England forcing the family to move several times. Many of the parishes rejected his style of ministry and asked him to leave. Isabella was always ill and spent the majority of her life struggling with many different ailments. As a result of this Isabella left England and began traveling as a cure for her health, she left in 1854 at the age of twenty-two. Over many years she traveled to places including Asia, the Sandwich Islands, Hawaii, and both the Eastern and Western United States.

On her journey's she wrote many books made up of letters and journal entries she had written. The book A Lady's Life in the Rocky Mountains consists of the many letters in which she wrote to her sister during the six-month journey through the Colorado Rockies in 1973. She travels alone which is incredible when you think about the time frame we're looking at. It was not very common for a woman to travel alone, not to mention women of twenty-two. In fact, it was very uncommon for a woman to not be married with kids at this age. Now days we are starting families at a much later age than back in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. This woman obviously was brave and had a true adventures heart. She traveled often on horseback really not knowing where she would end up, and not knowing where she could and would find shelter, food, and water. She was a woman traveling alone in the wilderness. During the journey of this book Isabella travels over a thousand miles inn the Rockies, and most of this was during the dreaded Colorado winter.