The legend of Romulus and Remus begins at Alba Longa in the Alban Hills and ends on Rome's Palatine and Aventine hills, with a she-wolf's cave and a fig tree along the Tiber in between. The bronze Capitoline Wolf still carries the story to visitors on the Capitoline Hill.
The route follows the myth from the twins' birth to the quarrel that leaves Romulus as founder. Most sites are traditional rather than proven, and the stops say so.
The Irish legend of the Children of Lir runs from Lough Derravaragh in Westmeath to the Sea of Moyle off County Antrim, the mouth of the Bann, and Erris and Inishglora on the Mayo coast.
Four children of the sea-lord Lir are turned into swans by their jealous stepmother and spend 900 years on Ireland's waters. The route follows the three 300-year sentences to the bell that ends them. Several pins mark traditional areas, not exact spots.
The Mabinogion, Wales's medieval collection of myths, is set across Narberth in Pembrokeshire, Harlech, Tomen y Mur, Segontium and Dinas Emrys in Gwynedd. Its tales of Rhiannon, Branwen, Lleu and two fighting dragons have all been tied to real hills, forts and castles.
This route follows three of the Four Branches and two native tales, from Pembrokeshire to Gwynedd. Several identifications are traditional rather than proven, and each stop says so.
Egil's saga is set in Iceland, Norway and England, and begins at Borg, the farm where Skallagrim settled near today's Borgarnes. Its hero Egill is a poet and warrior whose road runs through the ale feast on Atløy, the battle of Vínheiðr, the Gulating assembly and York.
The route follows the saga from Skallagrim's settlement to Egill's old age, ending with the legend of his hidden silver near Mosfellsbær. Several places are only approximate, because the saga's sites are not firmly identified.
Robert Louis Stevenson's Travels with a Donkey in the Cévennes follows a real 1878 walk from Le Monastier through Pradelles and the hills of Gévaudan to Pont-de-Montvert and Saint-Jean-du-Gard, with a night at a Trappist monastery on the way.
The route follows his stubborn donkey Modestine from the first purchase to her sale, at the end of the trail that now bears his name (GR 70). One stop, near Fouzilhac, is approximate because the book gives no precise position.
Isabella Bird's 1873 ride through Colorado, told in A Lady's Life in the Rocky Mountains, runs from Greeley and Fort Collins to Estes Park, Longs Peak and Manitou Springs. She lived out of doors and on horseback, and climbed a 14,700-foot peak with the guide Rocky Mountain Jim.
Six stops follow her letters from the Plains into the mountains and on to Colorado Springs. Most pins mark towns, because her letters rarely name exact buildings.
Captain James Cook's third voyage ran from Plymouth Sound by way of Table Bay, Queen Charlotte Sound and Christmas Island to the Hawaiian Islands, where he first landed at Waimea on Kauai and later died at Kealakekua Bay.
The route follows the ships across seven stops: the Cape, a New Zealand anchorage, a coral atoll, and the two Hawaiian landfalls that ended the voyage for its commander. Positions for the bays and the atoll are approximate.
Francisco Vázquez de Coronado's 1540–42 expedition went from Montezuma Pass to Hawikuh, the Grand Canyon, Bernalillo and Kansas in search of a golden city. It found no gold.
The route follows six places tied to the journey, from the border memorial to Coronado Heights. Several routes and sites are only approximate, and the captions say so.
Pole to Pole with Michael Palin is a 1992 BBC series that follows the 30-degree east line of longitude from the North Pole to the South Pole, through Spitsbergen, Chernobyl, Istanbul, Wadi Halfa, the Ngorongoro Crater, Lake Tanganyika and Victoria Falls.
The route picks eight stops from the eight episodes, in order, ending at the Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station. Several are named only as towns or regions in the series summary, so those pins are approximate.
Long Way Down follows Ewan McGregor and Charley Boorman's 2007 motorbike ride from John o' Groats in Scotland through Silverstone, Tunisia and the pyramids of Giza to Cape Agulhas and Cape Town.
The route picks five stops along the 12 May to 4 August 2007 journey, from the Scottish start to the southernmost tip of Africa. Pins at Tunisia and Giza are approximate.
The Trans-Siberian Railway runs 9,289 kilometres from Moscow's Yaroslavsky Station across Krasnoyarsk, Lake Baikal and Khabarovsk to Vladivostok, crossing a record eight time zones.
The line was begun in 1891 and finished only when the Amur bridge opened in 1916. This route follows it west to east through five landmarks: the two matching terminal stations, the great Yenisei bridge, the loop line around Baikal and the long Amur crossing.
Francis Drake's circumnavigation ran from Plymouth through San Julian, Valparaíso and Callao to California and the Spice Islands of Ternate. The voyage lasted from 1577 to 26 September 1580.
This route follows seven stops, from the storm-hit departure at Plymouth to treasure at Callao and a royal welcome on Ternate. Several places are approximate, and the California landing is only traditionally identified.
John Muir's 1867 walk from Kentucky to the Gulf of Mexico passed Mammoth Cave, the Cumberland Mountains, Savannah's Bonaventure Cemetery and Cedar Key. He told it in A Thousand-Mile Walk to the Gulf.
The route follows the book from Louisville to Florida, then on to Yosemite Valley in 1868. Some stops are general areas rather than exact spots, as marked on each point.
Roald Amundsen's Gjøa expedition of 1903–06 was the first to sail through the Northwest Passage, from Beechey Island and Gjoa Haven in Arctic Canada to Nome in Alaska. Today the little herring boat sits in the Fram Museum in Oslo.
The route follows the voyage stop by stop: the Franklin memorial at Beechey Island, two winters at King William Island, a long ski trip to the telegraph at Eagle, the arrival in Nome, Gjøa's decades in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park, and her return to Norway.
Leif Erikson's voyage runs from Eiríksstaðir in Iceland through Brattahlíð in Greenland to L'Anse aux Meadows in Newfoundland, the only confirmed Norse site in North America outside Greenland.
The route follows the sagas: a boyhood on Erik the Red's farms, a crew of thirty-five, and the lands Leif named Helluland and Markland. The saga lands are only traditionally identified, so their pins are approximate regions rather than exact spots.
St Petersburg's history can be walked in an afternoon: from the Peter and Paul Fortress, where the city was founded in 1703, past Kazan Cathedral on Nevsky Prospect to Senate Square, Palace Square and the cruiser Aurora on the Neva.
Seven stops follow the city from its foundation through the Decembrist revolt of 1825, the assassination of Alexander II, Bloody Sunday in 1905 and the events of October 1917. The stops zigzag across the centre, so the pins are markers rather than a single line.
The Cuban Revolution runs from the Moncada Barracks in Santiago to a Mexican port, a mangrove beach near Niquero, the Sierra Maestra, an armored train in Santa Clara and the old Presidential Palace in Havana.
In December 1956 eighty-two men crowded onto the yacht Granma; only about twelve survived the ambush at Alegría de Pío. Two years later the rebels were in Havana. The route follows that arc in seven stops. Three of the pins are approximate, and two places have no pin.
Oda Nobunaga's rise runs from Kiyosu Castle and the Okehazama battlefield through Gifu, Mount Hiei, Nagashino and Azuchi to Honnō-ji in Kyoto.
The seven stops follow his campaigns in order, from a family struggle in Owari to the 1582 day Akechi Mitsuhide turned on him. Several are castle ruins or rebuilt replicas, and the Honnō-ji pin marks the rebuilt temple.
The Berlin Wall ran past the Brandenburg Gate, Checkpoint Charlie and Bernauer Straße, and much of that story can be walked today. It went up overnight on 13 August 1961 and stood until the border opened in November 1989.
This route follows the Wall from its first day to its afterlife: the gate it closed, the checkpoint where tanks faced each other, the station border hall, an escape tunnel, the memorial and the painted East Side Gallery.
Nelson Mandela's life runs from a Mbashe River village to the lawns of the Union Buildings in Pretoria, with stops at Fort Hare, Liliesleaf Farm in Rivonia, Robben Island and Victor Verster Prison along the way.
The route follows him from his birth in Mvezo on 18 July 1918 through student days, underground work, years in prison and his inauguration as South Africa's first democratically elected president on 10 May 1994. Most stops can be visited; the pins at Mvezo and Qunu mark the villages, not a single building.
The first transcontinental railroad began at the Sacramento waterfront in 1863, climbed through Dutch Flat and Donner Pass, and ended at Promontory Summit, Utah, where the Golden Spike was driven on 10 May 1869.
The route follows the Central Pacific's eastward build from California: the groundbreaking, Judah's Sierra survey, the granite labour of Chinese workers and the final ceremony. Some stops are approximate.
The Salem witch trials of 1692 began in Salem Village (now Danvers), reached the Witch House and Proctor's Ledge in Salem, and are remembered today at the Rebecca Nurse Homestead and the Salem memorial. More than 200 people were accused, thirty were found guilty and nineteen were hanged.
This route follows the story from the Parris household and the Nurse farm to the magistrate's house, the execution site and the 1992 memorial park. The Parsonage stop is approximate and has no map pin.
Bonnie and Clyde's two-year run took them from Eastham prison farm in Texas through a Joplin shootout, the Red Crown Tourist Court in Missouri and Dexfield Park in Iowa, to a roadside ambush near Gibsland, Louisiana.
This route follows the real trail in order, from Clyde Barrow's prison years to the morning of 23 May 1934 and his burial in Dallas. Some spots are only approximately known, and each says so.
Billy the Kid's story runs through southeastern New Mexico: the street of Lincoln, where he fought in the Lincoln County War and escaped the gallows, the stone hut at Stinking Springs, the plaza at Mesilla, and Fort Sumner, where he was shot in 1881.
The route follows Billy from the ambush of Sheriff Brady in April 1878 to his death and burial in July 1881. Lincoln and Fort Sumner can still be visited; some exact spots, such as the saloon and the trial room, are not pinned.
