Momotarō, Japan's peach-born ogre-slayer, is tied to Okayama through the legend of the ogre Ura, Mount Kijo's fortress, Kibitsu Shrine and Megijima, the island of caves linked to Onigashima.
The route follows the Ura legend from the hilltop fortress to the shrines of Prince Kibitsuhiko, then the island of ogres and the statue at Okayama Station. The Okayama link to the tale is modern, and some stops are traditional identifications.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
Wyatt Earp's story runs from the Long Branch Saloon in Dodge City, Kansas, to the Oriental Saloon, the lot beside Fly's and Boothill Graveyard in Tombstone, Arizona, and on to the railroad tracks of Tucson.
It follows the lawman from his 1878 job as a Dodge City assistant marshal through the Gunfight at the O.K. Corral on 26 October 1881 to the killings that followed in 1882. Exact buildings are uncertain for several stops, and those pins are marked approximate.
The California Gold Rush began at Sutter's Mill in Coloma in January 1848 and spread to Sacramento, San Francisco, Placerville and the boomtown of Columbia.
The route follows the news from a sawmill tailrace to a crowd in a San Francisco square, then to two mining towns where the rush turned into streets, aqueducts and brick buildings. Most stops can still be visited, though the Placerville pin is only the main street.
Palenque, Tikal, Copán and Chichén Itzá are four great Maya cities, from the jungle of Chiapas to the plains of Yucatán. Their kings built tombs, pyramids and monuments that archaeologists have read and dug out of the forest.
This route follows them in time, from Pakal's tomb in 683 to the capture of Copán's king in 738 and on to the pyramid and Sacred Cenote of Chichén Itzá. Pins at Tikal and Copán mark the whole site.
In 1860 Giuseppe Garibaldi sailed from Quarto near Genoa with 1,089 volunteers, landed at Marsala, won at Calatafimi, took Palermo and Milazzo, and handed southern Italy to King Victor Emanuel II at Teano.
This route follows the Expedition of the Thousand through seven places, from the rock where the Redshirts embarked to the handshake that helped make Italy. Several stops are towns rather than precise battle sites, and are marked as approximate.
Richard III's story runs from Middleham Castle in Yorkshire to Bosworth Field, where he died in 1485, and on to Leicester, where his grave was found under a car park in 2012.
The route follows his childhood at Middleham, the battle of Tewkesbury, the princes at the Tower of London, his last charge at Bosworth, and the Greyfriars dig and cathedral tomb in Leicester. The exact Bosworth battlefield is still debated.
Prince Charles Edward Stuart's 1745 rising began on the beach of Eriskay, raised its standard at Glenfinnan, won at Prestonpans and ended on Culloden Moor, after which the prince fled through Skye and Raasay.
The route follows the campaign from landing to flight in six stops across Scotland's west coast, the East Lothian coast, the area near Inverness and the islands of Skye and Raasay. Positions for the Skye crossing and for the battlefields are approximate, so check local signage before you go.
Mary, Queen of Scots was born at Linlithgow Palace in 1542 and beheaded at Fotheringhay Castle in 1587, with Holyroodhouse, Loch Leven and Carlisle along the way. Her life runs from a royal cradle to a prison and a scaffold.
The route follows seven places: her birthplace, the Edinburgh palace where Rizzio was murdered, the island prison she escaped, the battlefield at Langside, two English prisons and the site of her execution. Fotheringhay Castle was demolished, so only earthworks remain.
The Battle of Kulikovo, fought on 8 September 1380 at Kulikovo Field near the Don, made Grand Prince Dmitry of Moscow famous as Donskoy, "of the Don". The route follows him from Trinity Lavra and Kolomna to the battlefield, Old Simonov and the Moscow Kremlin.
It covers the muster against Mamai's army, the crossing in fog, the ambush regiment, the burial of the fallen and Moscow's burning in 1382. Battlefield pins are approximate because sources give no exact spot.
Hadrian's Wall ran 73 miles across northern England, from Segedunum at Wallsend on the Tyne to Bowness-on-Solway, begun in AD 122 under Emperor Hadrian. Six stops, from Chesters and Housesteads to Vindolanda and Birdoswald, show how it was built, changed and garrisoned.
The route follows the wall west, from Roman forts to the Solway shore. The exact western end of the wall near Bowness is not known.
Miyamoto Musashi, Japan's most famous swordsman, moves through this route from the Sekigahara campaign of 1600 to the duel on Ganryū Island, Osaka Castle, Kumamoto Castle and the cave of Reigandō, where he wrote The Book of Five Rings.
The route follows the biography stop by stop, from a village birthplace that sources place in two provinces to the cave where he spent his last years. Several details, including his role at Sekigahara and Osaka, are debated or rest on later accounts.
Root Letter is set in Matsue, Shimane, and its backdrops copy real places: the Shimane Art Museum, the Kyomise shopping street, Lake Shinji, Yaegaki Shrine and Matsue Castle.
A man travels to Matsue to find Fumino Aya, a pen pal who vanished 15 years earlier, and questions her old classmates one by one. The route follows five real places that the game turns into scenes, from the lakeside city to a shrine tied to the Yamata-no-Orochi legend. The game's order of visits is not documented, so the stops are a sequence, not a timetable.
Tom Clancy's The Division 2 is set in a ruined Washington, D.C., from the White House and the Capitol to Roosevelt Island, Union Station and the Tidal Basin.
Seven months after the Green Poison outbreak, five factions carve up the capital and the Agent works to restore order. This route follows the game's key places, with a note on what each real landmark is today. The developers described the map as a one-to-one recreation of the city.
Beatrix Potter's tales are set in the real Lake District: Mr McGregor's garden at Lingholm near Derwentwater, Owl Island on St Herbert's Island, Mrs Tiggy-Winkle's home on Catbells, and the village and farm of Near Sawrey, including Hill Top.
The route follows five places from Peter Rabbit in 1901 to the Hill Top tales of 1907 and 1908, moving from the shores of Derwentwater to the house Potter bought in 1905. Some pins mark an area, not a single spot.
