When Eric Newby, improbably earning his living in the London haute-couture trade, sent his fateful cable – CAN YOU TRAVEL NURISTAN JUNE? – it was the first step on a legendary journey from Mayfair to Afghanistan and the mountains of the Hindu Kush, north-east of Kabul. Ill-prepared and inexperienced, Newby and Carless endured a month of hardship with great good humour in one of the most beautiful wildernesses on earth.

‘The most successful travel writer of his generation. It’s impossible to read this book without laughing aloud’ Observer

‘Tough, extrovert, humorous and immensely literate’ Times Literary Supplement

‘Full of serendipity and surprise’ The Economist

‘A total success’ New Yorker