FOLLOWING their nostalgic meander down Worcestershire’s River Severn though their extensive vintage postcard collection, Jan Dobrzynski and Keith Turner have now urned their attention to Herefordshire’s pretty river Wye.

A Postcard from the Wye is the title of their new book which continues the theme of A Postcard from the Severn and uses more than 200 of their old card scenes, capturing images of long ago when automobiles were few and far between, ponies and traps proliferated, ladies wore long dresses and most men had moustaches and hats.

It is claimed the Wye Valley was the birthplace of modern tourism, producing the domestic version of the Grand Tour in the 18th-century, as travellers wondered at the succession of views along the river’s 130-mile length.

There were boat tours to take in the sights and by 1850 more than 20 accounts of the Wye tour had been published.

In many ways this is another, but viewed through the lenses of photographers who captured for eternity an Edwardian summer day on the river, the glory of the civil engineering of the Elan dams or the age when to “go boating” was just the thing.

The Wye flows from the high slopes of Plynlimon – incidentally, its source is only two miles from that of the Severn – and passes through the middle of Herefordshire, including the city of Hereford itself, before heading out towards the sea in the Severn Estuary at Chepstow, Monmouthshire Between them Dobrzynski and Turner, who are both from Kidderminster, have many thousands of postcards covering a multitude of subjects and the problem here was probably one of choice.

They’ve simplified this by segmenting their subject.

There is the initial chapter covering the birth of the Wye and following it to Rhayader and the reservoirs of the Elan Valley. Then the section through the heart of Wales, before entering Herefordshire and becoming a very English river. Finally there is the romantic Wye and the Monmouthshire Wye, chapters with magic names like Tintern and the breathtaking scenery around Symonds Yat. In fact, the beauty of the Wye valley was one of the first natural features to be used to educate the public into appreciating the glory of the British countryside. In his Observations on the river Wye, produced in 1770, William Gilpin assessed locations along the Wye for their “picturesque beauty”. Those that met his criteria were deemed worth visiting.

This was a new concept for British travellers, who had previously overlooked what was in their own backyard. Dismissing the uncultivated landscape as seriously unpleasant, frightful and gloomy. Gilpin’s book was a best seller and set tourism on a completely new course, ushering in a new romantic movement in the arts that saw writers and painters capturing in words and pictures the untamed side of nature.

Nearly 250 years later, the river Wye remains remarkable unchanged and still retains the magic of the wild country.

A Postcard from the Wye by Jan Dobrzynski and Keith Turner is published by the History Press, £12.99.