A Financial Times Summer Book of 2019 Seasoned adventurer Alastair Humphreys pushes himself to his very limits - busking his way across Spain with a violin he can barely play. In 1935 a young Englishman named Laurie Lee arrived in Spain. He had never been overseas; had hardly even left the quiet village he grew up in. His idea was to walk through the country, earning money for food by playing his violin in bars and plazas.