Walking means slogging, ankle deep or more, through cold, claggy clay, navigating puddles of yellow water overhung with dripping trees.
For the first time in Davis Cup history, all four quarterfinals will be contested on clay, which is another positive development as long as the outdoor courts do not turn into mud puddles in the rain.
Pouring rain did not deter guests, including Oscar winner Alicia Vikander and other brand ambassadors Catherine Deneuve, Jennifer Connelly, Jaden Smith and Léa Seydoux, from skipping over mucky clay-coloured puddles to get to the show.
But the cracks had, if anything, closed a little and the puddling clay clung to the tyres, then shot up in little gobbets of mud as if the wheels were threshing the earth.
Canals originally crossed valleys on heavy masonry structures supporting the full formation, including puddled clay lining.
Leakage also meant that some sections needed to be lined with puddle clay.
Savings were made by using concrete for the foundations and bottoms of tanks, rather than brick and puddle clay.
When Michael Orbison, president of the West Side Little League, looks out over the baseball and soccer fields at 103rd Street in Riverside Park, he sees ground without grass, clay infields bruised with puddles and the need for a private group to restore and protect the land.
Apart from the energy that powered the first industrial nation, it produced brass bands, militant politics, male-voice choirs, giant vegetable contests, the hobby of pigeon-racing and, at least in Scotland, a sport called "quoits" where competitors threw iron rings into a distant puddle of clay.
