“During her travels round her native Wales, Hannah Engelkamp demonstrated grit and determination… Now in this glorious debut work she deploys just the right balance of warmth, wit and good humour”

Mark Cocker, one of Britain’s foremost nature writers and author of Crow Country and Birds Britannica

“It’s one way of making sure you really experience a country: see it through two pairs of eyes”

The Independent

“A donkey? This might not be everyone’s idea of fun…”

ITV Wales

Hannah has never owned a creature larger or more lively than a stick insect, which might explain why she thinks that roaming around the thousand-mile circumference of Wales with a donkey will be meditative and tranquil. It won’t be, of course.

Hannah is an optimist, but frightened of the dark, the quiet and, above all, the responsibility. Chico is keen and strong, but wholly untrained and deeply unconvinced about Hannah. And Wales’s epic coast path has 410 stiles and 783 kissing gates, each one unnavigable to a donkey.

Seaside Donkey is a funny, refreshingly unsentimental, and often alarming story about mismatched companions, and the power of being bold and living simply. Chico’s charming presence serves to break down barriers, sometimes literally, and it turns out that being tethered to a donkey yields a surprising wealth of unsolicited wisdom, sometimes painful and always profound.

Seaside Donkey on Amazon

If you’ve bought, received and read this book, I hope you enjoyed it! Please consider writing me a review on Amazon. Those guys really care about reviews, and it makes a book much more visible on their epic website. Also, I’d like to know what you think!

Publishing information

Copyright © Hannah Engelkamp 2015

ISBN 978-0-9932136-0-1

Edited by Lucy Ridout
Designed by Isobel Gillan
Cover photo by Rhys Thwaites-Jones
Cover magic by Jasia Warren
Maps by Hannah Engelkamp
Internal photos by Hannah, Rhys, Alan Hale and Rob Browne
Printed in Poland by Books Factory

Welsh pronunciation

This book is full of Welsh place names, and if you don’t speak Welsh but would like to know how to pronounce them, there is a full and fairly entertaining glossary, plus some general tips, at www.seasidedonkey.co.uk/welsh I decided to mix Welsh and English spellings of place names to reflect the most common usage.