Travels with a donkey in the Cevennes

the long version

Travels with a Donkey in the Cevennes recounts Robert Louis Stevenson's 120 mile, 12 day hike, accompanied only by his stubborn and unwieldy donkey, through the Cevennes of south-central France. A pioneering piece of outdoor literature, it is one of Stevenson's earliest works, and one of the earliest accounts of hiking and camping for recreation rather than necessity. Stevenson's route is still popular today; recently when asked why the Scotsman still informs the identity of the Cevennes, a politician and historian of the area remarked "Because he showed us the landscape that makes us who we are."