Why does Yorick travel through France in A Sentimental Journey?

In the novel A Sentimental Journey Through France and Italy, the character Yorick travels through France not to sightsee or visit art collections, but to make meaningful contact with people.1

While the novel is a work of fiction, it was inspired by the author Laurence Sterne’s own real-life travels. In 1762, after suffering from severe lung hemorrhages, Sterne fled the damp climate of England for France, a journey he described as a flight from death. These experiences abroad provided the material for his final novel, which he termed a "sentimental" journey because its primary focus was the pursuit of human connection through "sentimental commerce".1