Sarah Davies (née Forbes Bonetta) by Camille Silvy, 15 September, 1862. National Portrait Gallery, London

‘Off the Beaten Track’ at The National Portrait Gallery until October 31, 2004, is a witty and inspirational celebration of women travellers. The exhibition spans three hundred years, from 1660 to 1960, and chronicles journeys as far afield as Russia, the Far East and the Americas.

The women featured are a diverse, hardy bunch of wives, mothers, lovers, socialites, academics, artists and writers. Their stories are presented through portraits, letters, art and souvenirs.

Some travelled for love, some in search of good health, others for adventure or escape. Whatever the motivations behind their journeys, these women were explorers. They ventured beyond the boundaries of their everyday lives in times when the politics and practicalities of travel, particularly for women, were still a real challenge.

Dame Freya Stark, by Herbert Olivier, 1923. © Estate of Herbert Olivier

If this exhibition doesn’t motivate you into flinging your flip-flops into a backpack and sallying forth to seek out your destiny, then nothing will.

Speaking personally, I’ve long been under the fond misapprehension that my own travels as a young thing were rather plucky. I now know they were tame. At no point did I have to beat a crocodile off my canoe with a paddle as Mary Kingsley did.

I have, sadly, never had to lie on top of a local man while he steered our inflated animal hide across a river, as Penelope Chetwode did in Northern India.

Dame Kathleen Mary Kenyon, by Jorge Lewinski, 1969. Jorge Lewinski

To add to the feelings of inadequacy and missed opportunities, one of the women in the show is an ancestor of mine, increasing the feeling that I really should be getting out more, if only to continue the family tradition.

A tiny portrait of Barbara Bodichon nestles in a glass case in the Africa section. Bodichon was an aunt – four ‘greats’ back on my mother’s side. She was born in 1827, the illegitimate daughter of a radical MP. She founded Girton College, Cambridge and was a leading voice in the fight for votes, education and rights for women.

As if that wasn’t enough, she was a respected artist, wrote prolifically and numbered George Eliot, Ruskin and Rosetti amongst her friends. In other words, a rather daunting ancestor to have.

As I look at her portrait – a tiny, dignified profile complete with the ‘strong’ family nose, I wonder what she would think of her female descendants now.

The Cactus Grove, near Algiers. Barbara Bodichon, late 1850s, Hastings Museum and Art Gallery

I saw in my seventeenth year in Marrakech, sat up in Penn Station all night once, alone, shivering with fright. I could direct you to the best tavernas on several Greek islands. Others of us are scattered around the world, working, voting and educated, making full use of the rights and freedoms that she had a hand in creating.

Barbara Bodichon, 'Holmes of New York', 1850s, Hastings Art Gallery.

I like to think that my younger sister would meet with particular approval, living as she does with her little girl in a customised truck, on the road. She’s a true traveller, dreadlocks and all, living life very much ‘off the beaten track’ somewhere in Spain.

Women are travellers now as never before. This exhibition celebrates those women who set off first and paved the way. It’s well worth the journey.

If you would like to explore more work by Barbara Bodichon, Hastings Museum has a permanent display.