The Grand Tour

So this week, we're moving on from medieval pilgrimages and studying the lure of the "Grand Tour" in the mid to late 1700s. What did this continental adventure entail? Well for privileged young gentlemen (and a few lucky ladies!) the Grand Tour was the perfect capstone to their education.

They'd set off from England and travel around Europe, experiencing the history and culture from their textbooks for themselves in person. After years of studying their heritage, they'd set off on a journey to physically see the legacy left them from years of old.

They would hit up cities in France and especially Italy seeing the sights and proving themselves to be connoisseurs of culture. The goal was to create young men who were ready to take their place in society as guardians of the past who would move England forward with respect for their history and wisdom to manage current social and political affairs.

I mean, history like this is just SO much better in person!

It was a coming-of-age study abroad that whisked them around the continent soaking in certain specific lessons and experiences so that they would be fully prepared to settle down and participate in polite English society. And how could one do that without tales of travel and souvenirs of classical art/history?

So, turning back to me - do I relate at all to this idea of the Grand Tour??? Well, I'm definitely learning valuable things like:

...the best flavors for eating my weight in gelato. How to order my gelato politely in Italian. And the best spots in Viterbo for taking selfies with said gelato.

Ok, but gelato jokes aside, I definitely am learning on this trip! My class has been fascinating teaching me about the lure of Italy as I experience it for myself. Different field trips have allowed me to step foot in so many different towns and learn about what makes each one unique. Each day, I'm learning a bit more about daily life in Italy. And I gotta say, it's pretty spectacular.

Edward Gibbon, a "tour-ist" we studied in class said it best in a letter home:

"I am now Dear Sir at Rome. If it was difficult before to give you...any account of what I saw it is impossible here...I am really almost in a dream. Whatever ideas books may have given us of the greatness of [the Romans], their accounts...fall infinitely short of the picture of its ruins. I am convinced there never existed such a nation and I hope for the happiness of mankind there never will again. I was this morning on the top of Trajan's pillar. I shall not attempt a description of it. Only figure to yourself a column 140 foot high of the purest white marble composed only of about 30 blocks and wrought into bas-reliefs with as much taste and delicacy as any chimney piece at Up-Park."

While he was speaking about Rome, this quote honestly summarizes my whole adventure in Italy perfectly. Italy is a country rich in our imaginations. We've studied some of the history. We're aware of the major attractions. But nothing could prepare you to see it in person. Words fall short of capturing the true majesty of it, and Gibbons expresses that so eloquently. Yes, pictures of the Colosseum are cool. But let me tell you they hardly do it any justice at all.

I relate to his struggle of figuring out how to talk about your experiences to people back home! He acknowledges it would be impossible to write accurately about Trajan's pillar and then makes an attempt to paint an image for his audience, knowing it's just not the same. I love the delight he captures of what it's like to travel and the frustration of not being able to show/tell others how it truly is.

Take Tuscany for example. I spent my weekend traipsing through the sun-soaked streets of the Tuscan towns and tried to somehow take pictures to send to family and friends back home. In this one, you can see the lovely valley in the background. Everywhere we went, you'd stumble down some little alley and end up at an overhang like this, throwing you right in to the beauty of nature.

And honestly, trying to get a decent panorama that managed to get the depth and variety of color, light, and flora in Tuscany was probably the most frustrating thing I've done here. Friends keep expressing how jealous they are of such incredible views, and all I can say is it's so much better in person.

So, I'm loving life on my own little Grand Tour of Italy. Maybe I don't have the same goals in mind as the earlier "tour-ists," and I'd like to think I'm travelling with a bit more of an open mind/perspective than they had. But even if the times have changed and I'm substituting in a few more gelato places for fewer museums, there's something to be said for educating yourself about the world by actually seeing it with your own eyes. Unfortunately, this truth simultaneously makes such once-in-a-lifetime adventures more incredible and also harder to share with others.

Don't get me wrong, I think it's great to take some shots and save/share them (I think my Instagram shows I have no problem posting my pics for the world, haha) But like Gibbons said, I could never find the perfect combination of words nor pixels to fully show you what it's like here.

I guess you might just have to come see it for yourself ;).