GTA Through the Italian Alps - A Walker's Guidebook

• Location
• Description
• Contents
• Introduction
• Sample Route
• Maps
• Updates
• Reviews
• Further Reading

Those lucky enough to have access to a library holding antique publications should seek out Sketching Rambles or Nature in the Alps and Apennines by Agnes and Maria Catlow (2 vols, James, Hogg and Sons, London, 1861) and The Alps from End to End by William Martin Conway (Westminster 1895), which saw his group recurrently mistaken for French spies. Another classic is John Ball’s The Alpine Guide, vol I ‘The Western Alps’ (revised by W.A.B. Coolidge, Longmans, Green, and Co, 1898). Many inspiring articles describing the Piedmont Alps have appeared in The Alpine Journal, notably D.W. Freshfield’s ‘The Maritime Alps. The Seaward Valleys in Spring’ and ‘The Baths of Valdieri in Autumn’ (February 1880), and R.L.G. Irving’s ‘The Ligurian Alps in Spring’ (August 1911).

A moving account of World War II partisan activity in the valleys surrounding Cuneo is Giorgio Bocca’s 1945 Partigiani della montagna (Feltrinelli), food for thought.

Lovers of wildflowers can do no better than the beautiful artwork of Christopher Grey-Wilson and Marjorie Blamey in Alpine Flowers of Britain and Europe (HarperCollins, 1995). An equivalent for birdwatchers is Bruun, Delin and Svensson’s excellent Birds of Britain and Europe (Hamlyn, 1992).

For short and long-distance walks in the Gran Paradiso National Park in Valle d’Aosta: Walking in Italy’s Gran Paradiso by Gillian Price, Cicerone, 1997.