The Kindness of Strangers is a collection of stories by accomplished travellers and adventurous souls.

Have you ever experienced kindness from a stranger during a trip?

I certainly have. More times than I can count. Those fleeting moments, gestures big and small have kept me safe, provided shelter and changed the whole course of journeys.

One memorable time, driving through the Guinea Highlands – a densely forested mountainous plateau between central Guinea and Liberia – kindness quite literally kept us on the road when our faithful old Nissan Patrol kicked the bucket.

We found ourselves stranded for 30 hours before another vehicle passed by.

Against all the odds, not only was it just about the only vehicle that could manage the weight of Mama Pouh (our aptly named 4×4), but the person driving it was Tony. And he was a really kind guy. A New Yorker, Tony had renovated a Landie and was driving it from Peterborough to Cape Town when he trundled past us on that track.

I know right, what were the chances?

He could have passed by but he stopped, and he towed us 65km to the nearest town where we spent days getting her fixed up. That (not so small) act meant everything. I’m forever grateful!

Travel opens our minds to the world; it helps us to embrace risk and uncertainty, overcome challenges and understand the people we meet and the places we visit. But what happens when we arrive home? How do our experiences shape us?

I’m loving a book that explores what it means to be vulnerable and to be helped by someone we’ve never met before. Someone who could have walked (or driven!) past, but chose not to.

The Kindness of Strangers is a collection of stories by accomplished travellers and adventurous souls like Sarah Outen, Benedict Allen, Ed Stafford and Al Humphreys, who have completed daring journeys through challenging terrain, adventuring from the Calais Jungle to the Amazon, from Land’s End to the Gobi Desert, from New Guinea to Iran and many other places in between.

Each has a story to tell of a time when they were vulnerable, when they were in need and a kind stranger came to their rescue.

If you’ve been feeling the strain of the ongoing uncertainty on our planet, then this is a book for you.

It’s packed with stories that make our hearts grow, stories that will restore our faith in the world and remind us that, despite what the media says, the world isn’t a scary place – rather, it is filled with Kind Strangers just like us.

All royalties go directly to fund Oxfam’s work with refugees.