I've mentioned before that Bill Bryson is one of my favorite authors- he's hilarious, and he's mostly (though not solely) a travel writer, so he's pretty much doing my dream job. I've been reading Bryson's In a Sunburned Country lately, and laughing out loud quite a bit. It's about Australia- I've never been to Australia. Do most people read travel books of places they've never been and have no immediate plans of going to? Doesn't matter. Reading such books inspires me to want to go there, wherever there is, someday. Here's a sample excerpt, pretty much chosen at random out of all the fantastic ones I could pick:

Never before had so many people been moved such a great distance at such expense- and all to be incarcerated. By modern standards, their punishments were ludicrously disproportionate. Most were small-time thieves. Britain wasn't trying to rid itself of dangerous criminals so much as thin out an underclass. The bulk were being sent to the ends of the earth for stealing trifles. One famously luckless soul hd been caught taking twelve cucumber plants. Another had unwisely pocketed a book called A Summary Account of the Flourishing State of the Island of Tobago. Most of the crimes smacked either of desperation or of temptation unsuccessfully resisted.
Generally the term of "transportation" was seven years, but since there was no provision for their return and few could hope to raise the fare, passage to Australia was effectively a life sentence. But then this was an unforgiving age. By the late eighteenth century Britain's statute books were weighty with special offenses; you could be hanged for any of two hundred acts, including, notably, "impersonating an Egyptian." In such circumstances, transportation was quite a merciful alternative.