Blue Guides: Complete Cultural Guides -- The Southwest of France is a key destination for long leisurely stays or weekend breaks. Delia Gray-Durant, an art historian who has lived and worked in the region, knows this landscape of contrasts intimately. Mountains, rivers, rolling hills, pine forests, and the Atlantic coast have determined the spectacular range of food and drink on offer. Its artistic, architectural and historic inheritance is equally wide-ranging: caves decorated by prehistoric man; superb Romanesque pilgrimage churches and forbidding Gothic ones; grand 18th-century and cityscapes; eclectic seaside architecture; and rich art collections including a museum dedicated to Toulouse-Lautrec. Illustrations to inform rather than to decorate: maps, diagrams, floor plans, architectural details and photographs -- "Often plagiarised by other guide writers, Blue Guides have always been a gold standard for accuracy and depth" Daily Telegraph. "Guide books in the grand tradition of thoroughness and objectivity" Georgia Review.
