An Old Friend’s Britain

“Oh, it’s perfect. Exactly what I need.” My friend’s gift, a book, fit nicely in one hand.

Bendable in a fragile way, its worn red binding was enriched by gold lettering on the front and spine. The first line, slanting in a classic script, spelled “Baedeker’s.”

“Great Britain,” announced the block letters beneath, their upright dignity embellished by modest tails on the initials G and B.

I spied a faint trace of marbled veining decorating the edges of the tissue-thin pages. Gently I turned to the title page, with special care for the facing fold-out map of England and Wales that clung tenuously to a yellowed strip of transparent tape.

This Sixth Edition of “A Handbook for Travellers, Revised and Augmented, with 22 Maps, 58 Plans, and a Panorama” was dated 1906.

Eight-Week Trip

So when spring came I slipped the small red volume into my suitcase, along with pairs of comfortable walking shoes, rolls of color film and other necessities for an eight-week visit to the British Isles. Having already inspected much of the finely printed text, I realized that the guidebook might appear to some people rather old-fashioned as a jet-age traveling companion.

Consider, for instance, the gallant recommendation: “When ladies are of the party, it is advisable to frequent the best hotels, as the charges of the second-best are often not appreciably lower, while the comforts . . . are considerably less. Gentlemen traveling alone, however, will often find comfortable accommodation at a moderate rate in smaller inns of quite unassuming appearance.”

I was not at all put off by such unliberated turn-of-the-century cautions. Rather, I was curious to experience why generations of pre-World War I tourists made “Baedeker” a synonym for travel guide. I did have one thing in common with the traditional Baedeker traveler. I was determined not to rush through the British countryside under pressure of a strict itinerary that allowed no time for mood or whim.

For company, I would have a wise and reliable friend to offer thoughtful options but leave me free to follow my own path at my own pace. Granted that the guide’s introductory “Outline of English History” went only as far as the “present sovereign . . . King Edward VII,” yet what fun it would be to match the detailed descriptions with the Britain of Edward’s great-granddaughter, Elizabeth.

Thus, on a sparkling April Thursday, I set out on Baedeker “Route 60,” which stretched from London’s Liverpool Street Station toward the flatland of East Anglia. I was heading for Norwich, the county town of Norfolk 114 miles northeast of London.

I expected to find the population grown beyond the 1901 figure of “111,728 inhab.” and perhaps business still booming among the “large manufactories of mustard and starch, ironworks, and breweries.” I also looked forward to seeing the cathedral, which “was begun in 1096, and has preserved its original Norman plan more closely than any other cathedral in England.”

Inflation’s Toll

Naturally I was prepared to pay more than the Baedeker “1 shilling” for the half-mile taxi ride to the Maid’s Head Hotel--”near the cathedral . . . in a quaint old building of the 15th Cent., comfortably fitted up.”

A welcome change on arrival was the quiet of the city after the din of London. “Thursday early closing,” explained the taxi driver. The stillness was enhanced by the view from my hotel window, over tiled roofs and chimney pots to a sunset-lit skyline that blended old stone church towers with blocks of modern commercial concrete.

Comfortably fitted up, I slept well and rose early to witness the streets of Norwich erupt noisily in a jam of lorries and autos. At 8 a.m. on a Friday, I reckoned their drivers must be on the way to work at the Kiltie Shoe Factory, Watney’s Brewery, the Anglia TV Studios, Mackintosh’s Chocolate Factory, Jarrold & Sons Printing Works. . . .

By then I was up to the minute on local commerce with a gigantic Jarrold map of Norwich, a timely mate to the two-page Baedeker version by that publisher’s noted Leipzig map-maker, Wagner & Debes.

I decided that the cathedral could wait for the serenity of a Sunday morning. The castle I put on hold, too (“a Norman keep . . . 70 ft. high . . . containing fine collections of birds and fossils, the grounds surrounding it . . . a public garden”).

Flowers and Fish

I was off first to the Market Place west of the castle. I found shoppers crowding before stalls under striped awnings that sheltered the day’s selection of flowers and fish. Added to the site since Victorian times was a dominating city hall.

Among potential buyers testing the quality of woolen clothing, a modish woman sported a motorcycle crash helmet as sturdy as the long-wearing fashions suspended in dense display.

“When ladies are of the party . . .” ran through my mind as I abandoned the market for a stroll along narrow Norwich streets. Past churches of brick and stone I sauntered, past patches of new lawn and fruit trees flowering, to a stern notice from Chief Constable Plume, warning: “Persons riding bicycles or other vehicles along this footway are liable to be proceeded against and fined.”

Easily intimidated, I fled next morning to Cromer, 24 miles northwest of Norwich and “perhaps the most charming spot in East Anglia, . . . a flourishing watering-place with a pier (500 ft.), a spacious esplanade, admirably firm smooth sands, and cliffs 60-200 ft. high.”

The bus swayed down hedge-bordered lanes, while upper-deck passengers enjoyed a clear sight of new lambs and gardens showing spring. In Cromer the sea was a faded blue, the long stretches of sand empty except for a few pre-season shore birds.

Children sailed boats in a park pond atop the cliffs, and rows of dark-brick flats advertised “Bed and Breakfast” in windows gleaming in anticipation of summer guests.

Back in Norwich, Sunday was properly serene when I entered the cathedral close by the Erpingham Gate. Twenty-five Baedeker pages covering “A Historical Sketch of Architecture in England” qualified me to appreciate the handsome structure, “407 ft. long, 72 ft. wide, 78 ft. across the transepts. . . .”

Omitted from the Baedeker record was an elderly sexton with breakfast egg on his chin. Also undocumented, and understandably so, was the small square of flowers behind the cathedral, honoring the grave of nurse Edith Cavell, martyred in World War I and a native of Norwich.

Ever-Ready Guide

In the following weeks, as I ranged from the Scottish north to the south Cornish coast, I was on my own yet never really alone. Always accessible in my tote bag was a pertinent Baedeker commentary. “The train now crosses the neck of the promontory ending in the Great Orme and Little Orme,” chattered my red-bound guide on a Whitsun holiday, “while the fine estuary of the Conway comes into view in the front, backed by the mountains of the Snowdon range. . . .”

En route to the resort of Llandudno, “the most fashionable of Welsh watering-places and a good starting-point for many of the finest excursions in North Wales,” I was also assured that Welsh spelling “is not so formidable as it appears on the surface.”

Fine weather after a week of storms had attracted Britons eager to bask in the chilly May sunshine, watch sailing races and touring bicyclists, take boat rides and eat rock candy. My companion suggested: “Visitors should not omit to ascend to the top of the Great Orme, either by cable-tramway or on foot.” I rode up and walked down.

“The Marine Drive, 5 1/2-M. long, which has been constructed round the face of the cliffs, is one of the finest drives in Great Britain.” I walked part way, peeking over the barrier to scan the Irish Sea and temperature-daring bathers reclining on the rocks below.

“Conway, with its picturesque castle, is within 4 M. of Llandudno,” prodded my adviser. So I took a bus there to see “perhaps the most beautiful ruin in Wales . . . built by Edward I in 1284,” and without prompting bought two books of Welsh folk songs in a Conway music shop.

On a bright afternoon, having bused to Carnarvon and toured its castle, I took another bus to Llanberis, “the ‘Chamonix of Wales’ . . . at the N.W. base of Snowdon.”

Up the Peak

Confident that this day would provide a high point of my British vacation, I boarded a mountain railway with facts in hand: The ride up this tallest peak in Wales was 4 3/4 miles long and would take 1 hours; the railway begun in December, 1894 and opened for traffic in 1897.

Even more inspiring than the gauge and steepest gradient, accurate to the half-inch, was the two-panel “Panorama From the Top of Snowdon,” which unfolded in delicate shades of sienna to identify surrounding heights and landmarks.

While we climbed I kept pace with the scenic narration I’d read the night before, from pass to precipice, from slate quarry to bridle track. Nor did I slight my fellow riders gazing entranced from the car windows, the energetic young hikers passing us, and the sea gulls that sailed on the strong air currents.

Turning full-compass at the top, I silently tongued the Panorama’s array of Welsh place names--Carnedd Dafydd, Moel-y-Gamelyn, Cader Idris, Mynydd Mawr--and squinted west toward the Wicklow Mountains of Ireland.

As I slowly spun from vista to vista, I felt the presence of that fine old Baedeker gentleman, pointing, naming, literately describing. With a courtesy and charm not always included in today’s hectic package tours, Mr. B. was good company far from home in spite of his age. Or perhaps because of it.