GOING FAR ON LITTLE

Otago Daily Times, Issue 23595, 3 September 1938, Page 4

GOING FAR ON LITTLE

MR CLARK'S EXCELLENT GUIDES

"Finland on £10"; 'Austria on £lO. By Sydney A. Clark. Illustrated. London: Nicholson and Watson. Each 7s 6d.

From the viewpoint of the traveller with small resources, Finland seems the ideal country. Mr Clark can make £lO go a long way in England, though his guide to that land is the least satisfactory in the series; or in France, where the things that provoke expenditure are never those on the itinerary; or in Germany, Italy, and other countries over which he has cast his appraising eye. But on the cost of seeing Finland he waxes almost lyrical. For £lO, he avers, one can spend fourteen comfortable days there, staying in good hotels, travelling first class by boat, second class in trains; by air on occasion if desired. And apart from the low cost of enjoying it, there is plenty to enjoy: "Her capital, the most northerly in Europe, is cheerful, bright and highly cultured. Her endless forest-girt lakes and rivers offer a type of placid locomotion —overland by steamer —found nowhere else ... to anything like so great an extent. Her cities, some very old, some very new, are of great variety. Her isle of Valamo is unique, a lovely sound-picture of old Russian orthodoxy at its best, a sight so improbable that it seems impossible. Finland is as clean as a Dutch—or Finnish—kitchen. It is musical, artistic, athletic. And the days in June and July are twenty hours long." Finland, in fact, is certainly worth the thought of those planning a tour abroad, and it is a pleasure to commend to anyone so engaged this, or any other, of Mr Clark's "£ 10 series" of travel books. He is an ever-buoyant and ever-practical guide, the best companion in print to-day for the plain man, tied to a careful budget, who wishes to make the most of his grand tour. Whatever other authorities are taken on tour, Mr Clark's books should be carried to whatever country they deal with, for they are compact, highspirited, and really helpful in the matter of saving and spending money to the. best advantage. It is unfortunate, in more ways than one, that events have occurred in Austria while his guide to that country was in the press which have made a change in circumstances. He emphasises, however, that advantages in economical sight-seeing have followed the change. A. L. F.