Winging It VS. Tour Guides

When traveling the tourist has a decision to make regarding how he/she wants to actually tour the area. There are different options that come along with this. Picture yourself on a holiday in Italy, we all know there are hundreds of historical sites that attract tourists from all over the world. So now among your options you can either A) pay to be on a guided tour, or B) explore the place on your own. This decision is definitely a matter of personal opinion and there are definitely pros and cons for each. The options will vary with different travelers.

Florence Guided Bike Tour

When deciding on your place of travel, we'll just stick with Italy for our example, you will most likely look at websites regarding travel idea and they will always have a few guided tours that you can spend some extra change on, or a lot of extra change on. If you know nothing about the background history of anything in Italy, then you may want to pay for the tour guide who actually knows what he's talking about and will most certainly speak English  When choosing one however, try to find a tour with good reviews. One of the most common complaints is that the tour guides are dry, bored, and just seem uninterested in the sites they are showcasing. As brought up in class, it seems as though tour guides leave out interesting facts about sites as well, ones that we would like to hear about. So the guided tours are nice if you have no idea where you are going or have no background history on the site.

Tourist Viewing Trevi Fountain

For the more adventurous, you could always explore the areas on your own. I feel this is common in travelers who take trips backpacking through Europe. If we are say, back in Italy, and we take a trip to the Trevi Fountain, we could read the background history they have posted at the sites and chat with a few locals to see what they have to say about the place. Exploring sites on your own gives you the freedom to view the site in your own way and have your own perspectives. It's nice to be able to linger for as long as you'd like at the sites you love and simply skip over the ones that have no interest to you. Also, while not being on a guided tour, you wouldn't feel so stuck to the tour group and would feel more free actually walk about and speak with locals or even other tourists. However, if you do not speak the local language traveling on your own can become a little difficult, but never impossible.

Traveling and sight seeing is always fun and eventful no matter which way you choose to view it. There are always pros and cons to every decision one makes. Whether you'd like to have someone that speaks English showing you the sites, or would like to be adventurous and take a leisurely stroll through the sites, it's all up to you. I personally would like to view the sites on my own and learn about them at my own pace while meeting new people and taking as much time as I'd like. I feel as though guided tours are rushed and I never get enough information about the things that interest me, and I get too much information about the things that bore me. A self guided tour is custom to your liking, which is how I prefer my travel experiences.

Tourism is a Museum

Personally, I should have written this post in the beginning of this project. In hind set, this is the essential issue at hand, yet it has not been covered. The main purpose of this blog is discuss museums and tourism, which is exactly what I and my group members have done. However, we have not discussed what makes tourism, tourism. To break it down, tourism stems from the need to be immersed in other cultures and the easiest way to access cultural ideas is through museums. In a sense, a tourist does not always have to visit museums, but those who visit museums are tourists, no matter what.

A typical American experience in New York City is a prime example of how to be quickly assimilated into a culture with minimal effort. Even as a New Jerseyan how lives merely an hour outside of the city, I still get a little culture shocked. The New York experience covers a large array of different opportunities to learn more about not only New York but America as well. The great part about NYC is its "museum mile" (it is exactly what it sounds like). With museums like the Metropolitan Museum of Arts, the Guggenheim, and the Museum of the City of New York within blocks of each other, tourists are likely to make this a pit stop when touring New York because it is the easiest way to not only see all of NYC but to learn more about how American culture stems from a variety of ideas.

But why put all of the museums in the city on top of each other? This is a common theme in large cities.    For example, London also has a museum mile made up of hot names like the British Museum, the Charles Dickens Museum, and the Sir John Soane's Museums. Unlike the museum mile of New York City, London's museum mile fits its own culture. Everything in New York falls into a grid shape pattern that expresses how Americans need to simply access their art and cultural. In London, their museum mile is spread out, allowing international tourist to not only view the museums, but to see parts of London as well.

In my opinion, there is a simple equation to why so many museums call major cities home. Seldom do tourists venture out to the small, mom and pop cities to do their sight seeing. So all in  all: a large city + a museum mile= a tourist hotspot, not only for international tourists, but for citizens as well. Tourism would be nothing without museums to marinate all who go in a city and country's culture.





http://travel.nationalgeographic.com/travel/city-guides/new-york-walking-tour-2/
http://www.museum-mile.org.uk/page2.html