2,000 miles on foot
Walks through Great Britain and France
From the introduction:
People write books on every conceivable topic nowadays, and perhaps it is as well they should. For more than thirty years I have been touring on foot, and during that time I have covered more than ten times the distance treated upon in these pages. I have not always made notes and sketches of my various tours; and the fact that these exist in the case of the tramps chronicled in the following pages, with the requests of friends, have involved me in publicity which was never intended when the walks were made.
I have, consequently, committed the sin — a pardonable one, I trust — of adding one more book to the publishing world's output. Walking has always had a peculiar charm and attraction for me, my chief object in touring on foot being to see thoroughly the countries I visited, and to get among the people and out of the beaten tracks. I have made no attempt at fine writing or finished drawing.
The sketches and notes were done off-hand and primarily as reminders of many happy days spent on foot at home and abroad, and on this account, these pages may, I am aware, merit no higher eulogy than that of a chronicle of very small beer. It remains to be stated that, as the walks were made in different years, I must beg the reader's indulgence if at times I lay open to the charge of repetition in any of my reflections and suggestions.
Some contents:
My Walkthrough Normandy (1902) . . i
I decide to go alone— My walking kit — St. Malo — Dinan and its quaint old buildings — My American friend — Breton workmen and their frugality — Dol — French cyclists — Mont St. Michel and omelettes — Avranches and portly innkeeper— Granville — Women workers in the fields — Coutances — Wild boar — French frugality — Good cooking — They cannot understand walking for pleasure — St. Lo — Bayeux and its tapestry — Forests of France — Caen and William the Conqueror — Its old-world dwellings — French style of living — Good coffee — Dives — Havre — Normandy women — French working classes — Two English cyclists — Etretat — Aiguille Creuse — Soaking wet — Clothes in the oven — Fecamp and Benedictines — St. Valery-en-Caux — Philosophy of tramping — Dieppe, and journey's end.
From Dieppe to Geneva (1903) ... 52
Dieppe— ^Journalist friend — Pilgrims' road to Rouen — Rouen and Joan of Arc — Its cathedral and old-world aspect — the Seine at Les Andelys —Charm of a hard day on foot — Vernon — Paris — Walking and sore feet — Typical Burgundian hostelry — Montereau — Stopped by the military — Sens — They are not all polite in France — Villeneuve — Joigny, an old-time Burgundian town — Auxerre — Avallon, so eminently respectable — Old Burgundians — Curious customs — General characteristics — Views of Burgundy — Costumes — Autun — Fine women — Couches les Mines — Grape harvest — Chalons — Louhans the quaint — Lons le Saunier — Alps — Clairvaux — St. Laurent — Morez — Col de la Faucille.
Through Brittany (1906) . . . .123
St. Malo to Dinan — The pardon of the Ble Noir, or Buckwheat — The costumes and doings — Satan and the holy water — Brittany, land of oak and granite — Others tramping — The "big shoot" — Bretons intensely religious — Priest admires my puttees — Treguier, old and weird — Ventente cordial — The horse fair— Morlaix and Anglo- Indian acquaintance — The village cure and cholera — Curious customs — The "Pardon" at Pleyber — Christ and the costumes — Landerneau — Le Faou — Rumangol — Notable place of pilgrimage — Quimper — Concarneau — Pont Aven — Quimperle — Pont Scorff — Hennebont — Transfer of land — Auray— Shrine of St. Anne — Dress in Finisterre and Morbihan — Carnac — Druidical stones — Beggar children — Intemperance — Vannes — Cheap living — Women's work— Ploermel and its "Pardon" — Plelan — St. Thurial — Meagre fare — Rennes — Indifference between landlord and tenants — Dinan.
the book details :Download 14.3 MB - contains numerous drawings