Every year, on March 8, the world celebrates women from all around the world, calling on gender equality and awareness against bias.

The date, known as International Women’s Day, celebrates the success of women, among others, in science, arts, and humanism.

Famous women as Marie Curie, Mother Theresa, Dolly Parton, who should be celebrated all year long, are honoured on this day to remind young girls and boys that women can do just as much as men can.

In the history of humankind, many women are known for their travel adventures in one part or throughout the whole world. These women may have been the pioneers of women travellers, encouraging millions or even more women who came after them and dared to travel the world, in most parts, dominated by men.

On this International Women’s Day, we have picked eight women travellers who have defied all rules and traditions in their time and made their dreams a reality – to travel the world.

Jeanne Baret (1740-1807)

Jeanne Baret had to be the first on our list. Known as the first woman who went to travel all around the globe, Baret did it by joining the world expedition of Admiral Louis-Antoine de Bougainville from 1766 to 1768 disguised as a man as the French Navy prohibited women on its ships.

Baret was not only an adventurous woman but also a smart and daring one. She changed her name to Jean Baret and enlisted as valet and assistant to the expedition’s naturalist Philibert Commerçon and travelled on the vessel for two years with 300 men.

While it remains u known when exactly her gender was revealed during her trip, Jeanne remains the first women to have seen the world.

Nellie Bly (1864 – 1922)

Nellie Bly, a pioneering American journalist who travelled around the world for 72 days, inspired by the fictional tale of Phileas Fogg, is a world record-breaker.

Bly started her trip in November 1889, and travellers by steamship, train, horse, rickshaw, sampan and all manner of local vehicles, through England, France, Egypt, the Pacific and United States.

Her trip was documented by the New York World, where she worked as a reporter. A year after her trip, she published a book about her travels, named Around the World in 72 Days.

Mary Kingsley (1862-1900)

At the age of 30, Mary Kingsley found herself all alone in London, with all her elderlies for whom she had cared, dead.

That is when she decided to do what was going to change her life forever – she travelled to Africa. She canoed up the Ogooué river and pioneered a route to the summit of Mount Cameroon, becoming the first European to do so. She also became the first European to remote parts of Gabon.

She later published a book titled Travels in West Africa, in which she criticized European imperialism and championed the rights of indigenous people.

Lady Hester Stanhope (1776-1839)

Stanhope was born into an eminent political family, and travelling was the last thing she would have thought of doing when she was growing up.

It is believed that a romantic disappointment prompted her decision to go on a long sea voyage. She first travelled the Athens, then in today’s Istanbul, proceeding to Cairo.

From there, she continued her travels in the Middle East, and within two years, she visited Gibraltar, Malta, the Ionian Islands, the Peloponnese, Athens, Constantinople, Rhodes, Egypt, Palestine, Lebanon and Syria.

Isabella Bird (1831 – 1904)

Isabella Bird, who was a was a British writer, archaeologist and political officer, started her travelling adventures at the age of 41, and didn’t stop until she was 72.

Throughout this period of 31 years, she visited America, India, Kurdistan, the Persian Gulf, Iran, Tibet, Malaysia, Korea, Japan and China. Her last trip was that in Morocco, at the age of 72.

Annie Londonderry (1870 – 1947)

This list wouldn’t be complete without Annie Londonderry, the first woman who travelled the world on a bike as in 1895 she became the first woman to bicycle around the world.

The 15-months long journey took her across North America, Europe and Asia in order to settle a bet between two rich Boston businessmen that no woman could cycle around the world in 15 months and earn $5,000 while doing so.

Londonderry proved both wrong.

Fanny Bullock Workman (1859 – 1925)

American explorer Fanny Bullock Workman is one of the first female professional mountaineers who set several women’s altitude records. She was the second woman to give a talk at the of the Royal Geographical Society.

Born into a wealthy family, Workman used her money to voyage around the world with her wealthy husband. After her husband’s retirement, the couple bicycled throughout Europe and wrote several books about their adventures.

Bessie Coleman (1892-1926)

And lastly, but just as importantly, is listed Bessie Coleman, the first black woman pilot in the world.

When Coleman couldn’t enter a flying school in the US due to her skin colour, she travelled to France and earned her pilot’s licence in 1921.

She is remembered for her performance of aerial tricks and lecturing in the US in a bid to raise funds for an African-American flying school.