Hiking Poland, Gorey Style, Victorian Travel, A.M. Reading & More: Endnotes 16 April

Every Friday, we celebrate the weekend — and all the reading and relaxing and daydreaming time ahead — with Melissa's favorite book- and travel-related links of the week. Why work when you can read fun stuff?!

This post is part of our Endnotes series.

The gloriously cheery crocuses above are found in Chochołowska Valley, the longest and the largest valley in the High Tatra Mountains of Poland. There are dense forests, pleasantly craggy limestone peaks, alpine meadows, shepherd’s huts, chapels, and flowers. So many spring flowers! According to the travel-related scuttlebutt, the must-eat treat after a hike there is apple pie with cream and blueberries, known as ‘Chochołowski Dessert.’

• In praise of Edward Gorey, style icon.

• Upper- and middle-class Victorians were mad for international travel. Here are the top 10 holiday destinations, circa 1825.

• Sorta related: a 19th-century bathing pool.

• Are you a morning reader? Cracking a book open in the a.m. is pretty sweet.

• How fabulous that the cure for the Pandemic Blues just might be poetry!

• Looking forward to this remake/adaptation of the John Buchan novel The 39 Steps, starring Benedict Cumberbatch.

• The Isle of Lewis is on my must-visit list, thanks to the novel The Black House (recommended in our Scotland episode) and photos like this:

• 7 Things You Didn’t Know About Alaska Totem Poles

• Soothe your weary soul with these transcriptions of Emily Dickinson’s handwritten poems.

• The glamorous Hotel du Cap-Eden-Roc is very dreamy — and has been for 150 years.

• Modern Mrs. Darcy spells out helpful guidelines for buddy reads.

• You definitely want to eyeball these 5 Art Deco masterpieces. The symmetry! The pastels! The glitz!

• This story about romance author and AMAZING HUMAN Mary Burchell is very life-affirming. Click through to read the thread.

• Hey-ho! A building at Godmersham Park where Jane Austen wrote some of her novels is about to become a guesthouse you can rent! Or you could make your stay in the UK more permanent by putting in an offer on this Dartmoor estate that inspired The Hound of the Baskervilles. It’s a mere £4.5 million. (The grounds are spectacular.)

• Give me all the novels set on spooky, isolated mountaintops!

• CrimeReads explains the ways that librarians are natural-born detectives.

• I like to imagine The Annual Meeting of Detective-Librarians being held here:

• We’re thrilled to announce that we’re (virtually) taking the Strong Sense of Place podcast to the Newburyport Literary Festival on 25 April. We’ll be doing a live Zoom version of our show with special guest Jasmin Darznik, author of the lovely novel The Bohemians. We’ll talk about life in Jazz Age San Francisco, David will quiz the audience with ‘Two Truths and a Lie,’ and we’ll share about books that transported us to the 1920s in the city by the bay. Registration is free, and the festival schedule is packed with bookish delights. Find all the info you need right here.

• Finally, let’s learn about governesses! (Hugs of thanks to SSoP pal Ellen for sharing this video with us.)

May you fully embrace your power as a remarkable human.

Top image courtesy of Dawid Zawiła/Unsplash.