Published: April 26, 2012
Words: 89,003 (approximate)
Language: English
ISBN: 9781476474168

Short description

The author and her husband devised a simple plan – to take a tent and the dog, and drive around the perimeter of France. And like many simple plans, it went wrong before it started, and they ended up with two dogs and a campervan named Tinkerbelle.

Extended description

The author and her husband devised a simple plan – to take a tent and the dog and drive around the perimeter of France. Like many simple plans, it went wrong before it started and they ended up with two dogs and a campervan named Tinkerbelle. By the second day of their journey Tinkerbelle began to self-destruct, helped by the new dog who did his best to eat her from the inside out. This is their story, as they travel from sandy beaches to snow-topped mountains exploring the diverse cultures, cuisines and countryside making up the country called France. Their journey takes them to places out of the ordinary, meeting interesting characters and witnessing ancient traditions. The dogs rejoice in the freedom they find running on the beaches, while Susie and Terry frequently hold their breath wondering whether Tinkerbelle will manage to negotiate impossible mountain routes and get them home before she completely disintegrates. Travels with Tinkerbelle is a revision of "A Perfect Circle",.. (Read more) The author and her husband devised a simple plan – to take a tent and the dog and drive around the perimeter of France. Like many simple plans, it went wrong before it started and they ended up with two dogs and a campervan named Tinkerbelle. By the second day of their journey Tinkerbelle began to self-destruct, helped by the new dog who did his best to eat her from the inside out. This is their story, as they travel from sandy beaches to snow-topped mountains exploring the diverse cultures, cuisines and countryside making up the country called France. Their journey takes them to places out of the ordinary, meeting interesting characters and witnessing ancient traditions. The dogs rejoice in the freedom they find running on the beaches, while Susie and Terry frequently hold their breath wondering whether Tinkerbelle will manage to negotiate impossible mountain routes and get them home before she completely disintegrates. Travels with Tinkerbelle is a revision of "A Perfect Circle", previously published by Transworld Publishers. Like Susie's other bestselling books – Best Foot Forward, A 500 Mile Walk Through Hidden France and The Valley of Heaven and Hell, Cycling In The Shadow of Marie Antoinette – Travels with Tinkerbelle is a mixture of travel and history, sprinkled with humour. Enhanced features include links to more information about the most significant places visited on the trip and an accompanying on-line photograph album of the trip.
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Tags

france, south of france, camping, travel mishaps, travel adventure, travel guides, travel budget, travel france, france wine country, france humour, france food, france guidebook, camping france, holidays with animals, travelling with dogs, france humor

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Reviews

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Review by: Janine Marsh on Oct. 18, 2012 :
Susie Kelly, the author of the best seller Best Foot Forward… 500 miles through hidden France describes herself as “slightly scatter-brained… gets on best with animals, eccentrics and elderly people”.

Reading this book I’d say she is certainly fits the description and is possibly slightly bonkers in the nicest possible way. She is also a fabulous writer.

At an age when most women are content to take life a little slower and to relax if and when they can, Susie Kelly decides on somewhat of a whim to trek across France alone. From La Rochelle in the south west to Geneva in the east – a walk of approximately 500 miles.

After advertising on the Internet for someone to care for her animals whilst she embarks on her mad adventure for six weeks, she enlists the help of the wonderful Jennifer Shields, a Texan lady who is possibly as eccentric as she is. Arriving in rural Poitou-Charentes, speaking not a word of French, Jennifer takes over the running of the homestead and seems to have a few adventures of her own. Susie’s dogs run away, her neighbours are arrested, machinery is erratic and her father passes away whilst she is in France.

Susie’s grand idea came to her whilst out walking briskly around the local area in an effort to keep warm and occupied during a harsh French January. She found she liked walking and observing and after first considering a walk around the whole of France and rapidly dropping the idea of a scheme that would take a whole year she opts instead for a 500 mile hike to Lake Geneva.

From here on in the idea steam rollers ahead, she undertakes training which turns out not to prepare her as she’d imagined. She sets a strict budget for staying only at campsites and pitching her meagre tent and she is determined not to “cheat” by accepting lifts. She WILL walk the entire way unaided.

The book describes in wonderful details the sights, sounds and scents of her journey. There are charming cameos of the people she encounters and she has a rather unique perspective on just about all of them! A wry sense of humour, at times bitingly funny is clear throughout the book. At times she is overwhelmed by the generosity of complete strangers who help her on her way. Her writing is honest and warm and when bad things happen she shares this too, tales of personal discomfort included as her poor feet start to react to the working out of a life time.

Susie says she is not an “intrepid” traveller. Reaching the end of this book I must disagree – she is intrepid, brave and certainly eccentric. Her writing creates scenes that transport the reader to France and sweep them along the path with her.

A thoroughly enjoyable read and if you want to know if she made it – you’ll have to read the book. For an interview with Susie read http://www.thegoodlifefrance.com/a-french-book-interview-with-susie-kelly-best-foot-forward/
(reviewed long after purchase)

Review by: Ceridwyn Parr on Sep. 09, 2012 :
Travels with Tinkerbelle
6000 miles around France in a mechanical wreck
Susie Kelly
Smashwords Edition
reviewed by Ceridwyn Parr

If you are planning a trip around France, this is the book to keep loaded on your Kobo or Kindle. You will also need an accurate road map which you have carefully annotated beforehand. Even then you may be still mystified about some localities. But , as Susie describes with whimsy and honesty, this is part of the charm of travel.
Susie Kelly and her husband Terry are an English couple resident in France, living in Poitou-Charentes, an area so idyllic that the locals rarely move away. But the spirit of wanderlust invades their paradise, and they decide to drive the 6000 miles around France in 6 weeks. Quite a tight time frame means staying only one night in each place, so they have the anxiety every afternoon of where to stay, and where to eat, and where to exercise their huge and capricious dogs, and how to get the washing dry. Their route is an anticlockwise circle around the borders of France, portrayed in the prologue as a torn piece of fabric with dotted lines around the outside. The light hearted tone of the introduction draws the reader into what proves to be a much deeper exploration of history, French idiosyncracies, and enticing meals on the cheap.
There are some endearing characters in this story- Tinkerbelle of the title, a clapped out old campervan, whose inner weaknesses make driving over the Pyrenees extremely nerve-wracking; Terry who comes across as the dream travel companion -mostly unflappable, handy with a screw driver, happy to go where he is told, most of the time, and willing to walk the dogs; and the dogs. The dogs are not dream companions, but they are the stuff of humour when they steal pieces of clothing, and horror, as when they turn on the gas in the van. The adventures are told with a light hand and a deft descriptive brush by Susie, navigator, cook, and most valuably, French speaker .
A night in each place could mean a very superficial trip, but Susie has the gift of extracting a huge amount of local information and history at each turn of the road. Napoleon features frequently, as do the Resistance . There is a painful time as Susie and Terry explore the Normandy landing sites, seeing the impossibility of survival in the sand dunes and rocky beaches. Recent military history is balanced by visits to ancient castles, which often carry legends of maidens locked in towers, desperate family feuds and dastardly tales of treachery. The gloomy atmosphere of so many of these castles leads Susie to believe that an appropriate overall legend for these castles is ‘Abandon hope all ye who enter here’, but she can still take the reader through these buildings with charm and humour. At the end of every day there is a meal to be found- not always easy in France if you don’t eat meat. In coastal towns they feasted on oysters, mussels and other fish, and endless freshly baked bread, coffee and hot chocolate, but occasionally have to retreat to their campervan for instant soup and stale pastries. The variety of their travel experiences makes this a great read.
Susie concedes that circumnavigating France in six weeks was more difficult than expected, but that they would do it again, ‘ropey vehicle, destructive dogs notwithstanding’.
Technical afterword
I read this book as a Smashwords edition, on my laptop, as I still have not worked out how to get it on to my kobo, and I was very keen to get reading! Laptop reading is fine, just a bit heavier than the kobo. I note that ‘Travels with Tinkerbelle’ was first published as ‘A Perfect Circle’ in 2006. Much better title this time!
www.smashwords.com
(reviewed long after purchase)

Review by: Emily Casswell on Aug. 07, 2012 :
Travels with Tinkerbelle is, in the barest of terms, a travel diary. It carefully logs the places, the cuisine and the stories a couple and their two slightly mad dogs encounter on their tour de France.

Susie Kelly’s book is an adventure, just a more afforded, wine appreciating, dog walking type of adventure. Initially wary of the temperamental Tinkerbelle, their transport for the six weeks, and slightly nervous of their dogs, their companions for the next six weeks, you embark with them around the country. You find yourself in the campervan with them all, tasting the dishes, and more often than not tensing, as Tinkerbelle struggles and sputters up the winding Alpine roads.

Through the tour you learn, if you didn’t know already, that France is not one unified tradition of wine and cheese but a myriad of distinct regions. As you drive through the Basque country, the Alpine villages and the towns of Alsace Susie has worked hard to supplement simple descriptions of the places you visit. With every day there is an accompanying tourist information pack of the local anecdotes and myths which I won’t spoil for you.

The people you meet are caricatures of the regions. Most, though not all, of the encounters are as charming as Susie’s flare for descriptive writing. There isn’t a rock or a bird that isn’t painted without a flavour of the region. My personal favourites were the roads “with more twists and turns than a plate of spaghetti” and the little birds, “sparrows like clockwork toys”.

‘Travels with Tinkerbelle’ is a lovely summer read. My advice is to take it slow. Like most holidays you will find it is over too quickly. Be sure to keep a notebook nearby as you may find yourself planning your own travels, just maybe not in Tinkerbelle.
(reviewed within a month of purchase)

Review by: Jacqui Brown on Aug. 03, 2012 :
The chaos that is Tinkerbelle struggling along for 6000 miles, sometimes on difficult terrain with two adults and two large dogs, one still a puppy who delights in eating non-edibles, makes for some very funny tales to read. I think Susie has a great mix of describing the France they see out of the window, the often hilarious mishaps that occur, both from their four legged and four wheeled travelling companions, and interesting snippets of French history trivia. I learned a lot on my virtual travels with her and although many places they visited I was familiar with, I have added to my list of places I still need to get to. I was also pleased to confirm that it is not just us who struggle to find somewhere to eat out (or someone to serve us) in France!

I enjoyed this book, as I have Susies other books.
(reviewed long after purchase)

Review by: Sarah Bowdidge on June 22, 2012 :
Travels with Tinkerbell is an enjoyable book, filled with good information about lesser known regions and traditions of France. People interested in a part of france not usually explored in travel literature will enjoy the tale.

The best parts for me were about the dogs' escapades. Those parts had the most character and humour. More of this kind of writing and less prose about campgrounds and various towns would have made for a better read.

I also found the style lacked a certain finesse: the paragraphs jumped subject to subject with no transition; it often had a feeling of incompleteness and left me feeling disoriented.

Those issues aside, it's a good book. Please see my blog for full review: http://www.sarahreadstheworld.com

Disclosure: I received a free copy of this book in exchange for a fair review on my blog (and other sites). I was not paid and there was no expectation of a positive review
(reviewed within a month of purchase)

Review by: Iben Jakobsen on June 19, 2012 :
Like Kelly's other books – Best Foot Forward: A 500 Mile Walk Through Hidden France and The Valley of Heaven and Hell: Cycling In The Shadow of Marie Antoinette, Travels with Tinkerbelle is a mixture of travel and history sprinkled with humour. However, though still worth the read, it's not quite as successful as the other two. In Best Foot Forwards she walks across France, in The Valley of Heaven and Hell they bike around the country - in Travels with Tinkerbelle they ride a car. That's not nearly as big as a personal challenge - sure the campervan isn't the best of vehicles and it's mentioned here and there that driving it kind of sucks, but it's just not the same. In the other two books at the end of a day's travel she's got blisters or a sore butt, here she and her husband just want to stretch their legs and walk the dogs and may have argued extensively due to getting lost. It's really not comparable.
That being said, I did enjoy reading the book (though it felt incredibly long at times). It's got a few really great places, where I felt the spirit of the previous books, but mostly it's just a really long, yet often vague description of known and lesser known things to see around France. It never got so bad though, that I didn't feel like reading on; it was never a struggle to pick the story up again either. It's simply just not as good as the other two.
(reviewed within a month of purchase)

Review by: Joan H. Young on June 17, 2012 :
Travels With Tinkerbelle - 6,000 Miles Around France In A Mechanical Wreck

Susie Kelly is at it again: she was gripped with the itching wanderlust that had to be scratched. She and her husband, Terry, decide to buy a small motorhome and circumnavigate France. The fact that their budget is minuscule is immaterial. The fact that they also have a dog that will go with them isn’t crazy enough, they decide to get another puppy to keep the dog company. She describes the first dog as small. Several chapters later she reveals that the dog is a Vizsla! I own a small Vizsla– she weighs 50 pounds! The puppy-mutt they add to the crew grows to the size of a small pony, and chews everything in sight, nailed down or not.

The motorhome somehow makes the entire trip, although it’s unclear why. Important parts fall off or break regularly. Terry drives on, over mountains, and around hairpin curves, mostly unperturbed. We should all have such oblivious, patient partners. It may have helped that Terry doesn’t speak much French. Only once does Susie hint that they occasionally disagreed over travel arrangements.

Anyone who has taken a road trip will also identify with the problems associated with finding a place to stay each night. Motor camps range from first rate to mud pits.

Meanwhile, Susie and Terry visit small and large towns hunting for both publicized tourist attractions and those wonderful local secrets one can stumble upon when willing to talk to local folks. Her descriptions of these places will always give you a fresh look, even if you are familiar with the locale.

And it’s all told with a great sense of humor. One of my favorite passages relates how a tradeswoman tells Susie that the local snakes were dropped from a helicopter. Susie thinks she must have mis-heard. Several pages later, she hears the rest of the story. I’m always a sucker for funny stories where you have to wait for the other shoe to drop.

If you like travel stories, you’ll never regret the reasonable $2.99 to buy this book!
(reviewed long after purchase)

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