While we read history, Charlie Connolly decides to actually walk through it, acknowledging that he’s no power walker; he nevertheless decides to take to the road and follow in the footsteps of the likes of Boudica, King Harold and Bonnie Prince Charlie. His novel approach adds a new dimension of sore feet and slog to the historical facts but we can also marvel at the difficult journeys undertaken and share Charlie Connolly’s amazement at what historical evidence can still be found in the land around us.
And Did Those Feet - Walking Through 2000 Years of British and Irish History Synopsis
The landscape of the British Isles is filled with history, much of which we miss as it flashes past the car window. Do we even realise that we're following the same path as the Tolpuddle Martyrs, or that we're driving past the exact spot where King Harold was killed, shot through the eye with an arrow? As a lover of both history and the British countryside, Charlie Connelly decided to rectify this, and set out on a series of walks that recreate famous historical journeys. En route he retells the story of the original trip while discovering who and what now inhabit these iconic routes. Walking in England, Scotland, Ireland and Wales, Charlie journeys alongside Boudicca's ghost in Norfolk, relives Bonnie Prince Charlie's flight to Skye disguised as Flora MacDonald's maid and takes the same 32-mile round trip as the starving Louisburgh famine walkers. He suffers broken toes, becomes trapped in the Scottish Parliament and encounters dead poets and a surprisingly high number of mad old women in woolly hats. Told with Charlie's customary charm and wit, And Did Those Feet will reveal the historical secrets hidden in the much-loved coastal, country and urban landscapes of Britain.
Charlie Connelly is a freelance writer specialising in European sport and
travel and has written for BBC Match of the Day magazine, Four Four Two, Time
Out and the award-winning Scottish Sunday Herald Magazine.
