Ida Laura Pfeiffer

Ida Laura Pfeiffer (14 October 1797, Vienna – 27 October 1858, Vienna), née Reyer, an Austrian explorer, travel writer, and ethnographer, became a famous early female traveler; her bestselling journals were translated into seven languages. She journeyed an estimated 32,000 kilometres (20,000 mi) by land and 240,000 kilometres (150,000 mi) by sea through Southeast Asia, the Americas, the Middle East, and Africa, and made two trips around the world between 1846 and 1855.^[1] Though a member of the geographical societies of both Berlin and Paris, she was denied membership by the Royal Geographical Society in London as it forbade the election of women before 1913.