Salak is one of five people in the world to receive a 2005 National Geographic Society Emerging Explorer Award. She has traveled solo to almost every continent, visiting some of the world's remotest or most inhospitable places, including Madagascar, Borneo, Rwanda, and the Democratic Republic of Congo. She cycled nearly 800 miles across Alaska to the Arctic Ocean; she was the first person to kayak solo 600 miles down West Africa's Niger River to Timbuktu, a trip recounted in her nonfiction book, The Cruelest Journey. Salak has been selected by The Library of Congress for their "Women Who Dare" publications, which highlight the world's top women explorers and leaders. Book Magazine has called Salak "the gutsiest--and some say, craziest--woman adventurer of our day." Says The New York Times: "Kira Salak is a tough, real life Lara Croft."

Kira Salak has won the PEN award for journalism and appeared five times in Best American Travel Writing. She is a contributing editor for National Geographic Adventure magazine and was the first woman to traverse Papua New Guinea; Four Corners, her nonfiction account of that trip, was a New York Times Notable Travel Book of 2001. She has a Ph.D. in English and her fiction has appeared in Best New American Voices and other publications. Her nonfiction has appeared in such publications as National Geographic, The Washington Post, Travel & Leisure, Best Women's Travel Writing, National Geographic Adventure, The Guardian, and The New York Times Magazine.