Treasure the inside stories from travelers

I read with interest Susan Spano’s article on Ibn Battuta [“Ancient Tale Transports a 21st Century Traveler,” Her World, Oct. 30]. As a longtime student of the travels of Marco Polo, I realized the dream when I traveled solo along the Silk Road and on to Moscow for three weeks in early 1993, just after the fall of the Soviet Union. For the first time in modern times, there were no restrictions, no red tape and mostly open borders.

The ability to waltz (well, it wasn’t that easy) into Samarkand and Bukhara at my whim made me feel almost guilty, remembering the scores of scholars and travelers in centuries past, men of much greater stature than this humble traveler who were denied access to these fabled cities because of the vagaries of war and regime.

The accounts of only a handful of travelers have survived into history. Along with Polo and Battuta, accounts by two friars, William of Rubruck and John of Plano Carpini, form the bulk of our knowledge of what life was like at the center of the world in medieval times. Such is the arcane knowledge that drives the “traveler,” information that one rarely finds in a section curiously titled Travel.

I usually approach the Travel section with a somewhat jaundiced eye and cavalier attitude. Wading through the ubiquitous articles touting $200 B&Bs; and tony restaurants in chic, upscale resorts, it’s a long trek through the desert to get any substantial information. Please keep this flow of information coming.

LES ROBIN

West Hollywood