Educational Tourism

Thinking of Going Digital? Here are Five Tips to Help you Pick the Perfect Development Partner

in , , , , , , , ,
Thinking of Going Digital? Here are Five Tips to Help you Pick the Perfect Development Partner

We’re Engaged!

Join me in welcoming OnCell, LLC, as Time Traveler Tours, LLC's new development partner!

Now some of you might be imagining a group of guys with various color pens lined up in their pocket protectors, repeatedly pushing thick rimmed glasses back up onto the bridges of their noses. Not Team OnCell. These peeps are young, dynamic, hip, creative, and anything but a boys club. They speak the languages of code and user experience design and visual storytelling. They have made it possible for me and Team TTT&T to bring our unique storytelling concept to you on the touchscreen device of your choice. Here are a few members of the OnCell team:

Read More

Five Steps to Creating a Story-driven App Tour

in , , , , , , , ,
Five Steps to Creating a Story-driven App Tour

Eureka! We’ve cracked the code as to how weave a story into the fabric of a place!

If you’re an author wishing to write for us, a museum professional wishing to consult with us, an educator or parent wishing to time travel with us, or if you’re just plain interested, please read on…

Read More

Walking in the Footsteps of Giants

in , , , ,
Walking in the Footsteps of Giants

I write to you from Florence, Italy, where I am walking in the footsteps of Giants, specifically Michelangelo's and his David. Actually, I’m sort of stumbling about after them. But I’m on their trail, and getting closer all the time.

I'm here to walk the tour route suggested by Mary Hoffman's manuscript for In the Footsteps of Giants and to begin the process of weaving her story into this extraordinary historic place.

I've spent the past year researching the man and his works, his life and his times, in anticipation of reaching this stage in the creation of our next Time Traveler Tour.

I feel oddly close to him as I wander the streets whose names and stories I already know.

Read More

Michelangelo Meet-up in Music City

in , , , ,
Michelangelo Meet-up in Music City

I saw the advertising poster the minute I stepped off the plane in Nashville...

Twenty-six rare drawings by Michelangelo Buonarroti (1475–1564) on loan from the artist's family home in Florence were on exhibit at the Frist Center for the Visual Arts in the home of my youth, Music City USA.

A good omen for me and TTT&T in 2016!

Lily, Jim, and I had traveled to Nashville not just to ring in the holiday season, but to celebrate my parents’ 60th wedding anniversary with the rest of the extended Towle family.

Immediately I knew what I had to do...

Read More

The Key to Turning Kids on to History? Never Force It

in , , ,
The Key to Turning Kids on to History? Never Force It

My Kickstarter now over, I was back in Paris leading a group, 29 strong, of 17 and 18 year olds and five of their teachers. They came from Hull’s School in Zurich. I had been hired as their “docent” and itinerary advisor. My mandate: to provide context to what they would be seeing on their three-day whirlwind Paris tour and, of course, to turn them on to History.

The group’s lead teacher and I had been working since October 2014 to prepare the perfect program: lunch at a famed Paris bistro; a cruise on the River Seine; dinner at the Eiffel Tower; picnic in the Palais Royal gardens followed by a performance at the Comédie Française; a treasure hunt in the temple of impressionism, the Musée d'Orsay; and a guided tour through the vast Versailles gardens, with mini history lessons throughout.

But right away, the students had a lesson for ME...

Read More