A renowned explored, once dubbed ‘Dorset’s own Indiana Jones’ is to release a book charting his expeditions.

Colonel John Blashford-Snell has spent the past 60 years travelling to some of the planet’s most remote, inaccessible, and dangerous places in pursuit of scientific research, wildlife conservation and community aid.

The 85 year old is gearing up for a trip to Bolivia later this year but spent most of the pandemic writing, what he describes as, "an anthology of expeditions".

Utmost East to Utmost West goes to the heart of Blashford-Snell's international travels - from rain-soaked tropical forests to snake-filled swamps.

Colonel Blashford-Snell said: "I've been working on this book for a couple of years. I wrote my autobiography up until 1994 but of course there's a long gap between that and the current date: and I've done a hell of a lot of expeditions in that period. I thought it was time to update it so I've produced an anthology, it's not really an autobiography, so it's the story of all the major expeditions right up until just before the pandemic."

One of the stories retold by the Colonel is of a trip in 2000 where he delivered a grand piano to a remote Amazonian tribe.

Colonel Blashford-Snell, now based in Motcombe near Shaftesbury, said: "When we were helping a remote tribe in Guyana we had gone out to do medical work for them at the request of the Government; the chief priest of the tribe said to us 'when you come back would you do me a favour and bring me a grand piano?'.

"They had a chapel in which they held very long services and they were very musical and they wanted to keep the young people interested and stop them from going to the coast and getting into trouble.

"He'd only ever seen a picture of a grand piano so he had no idea the size of one. I was giving a presentation back in this country at one of the West End hotels and I happened to mention that, more in jest, and to my astonishment the general manager provided a grand piano."

The piano was flown from the United Kingdom to Trinidad with Blashford-Snell and some friends from the Royal Engineers then left to their own devices to deliver the piano to the tribe. The full story - including how the tribe moved villages at the last moment - is told in wonderful detail in the forthcoming book.

Aged 85, Blashford-Snell shows no signs of slowing down and is getting set for a visit to Bolivia in the coming months as part of his work with Just A Drop - providing clean water to remote communities.

From Utmost East to Utmost West: My Life of Exploration and Adventure by John Blashford-Snell is published by Bradt Guides on 7th October 2022.