Early examples of extended walking tours were undertaken by the Romantic poets, William Wordsworth and John Keats.
[2] In 1790 Wordsworth set off on an extended tour of France, Switzerland, and Germany, which he describes in his autobiographical poem The Prelude (1850).
John Keats, who belonged to the next generation of Romantic poets began, in June 1818, a walking tour of Scotland, Ireland, and the Lake District with his friend Charles Armitage Brown.
Walking tours were popular in the 19th century, and a famous example is Robert Louis Stevenson's Travels with a Donkey (1879).
Usually guided by actors in costume, these walking tours create the feel of living history "in a non-academic, very accessible fashion.