Context Has Obtained a Grant Enabling it To Operate Tours for Only 5 Euros, 5 Pounds, or 5 Dollars

It is always a pleasure to disclose an internet program that was developed as a labor of love and not for the purpose of scoring a financial coup. That is certainly the case of Context ( www.contexttravel.com ). A system of scholar-led walking tours in 19 cities (London, Paris, Rome, Berlin, Barcelona, Madrid, Venice, Naples, Edinburgh, Florence, Athens, Istanbul, Prague, Beijing, Shanghai, New York, Philadelphia, Boston, and Washington, D.C.), it was developed by an American couple living in Rome who were dissatisfied with the crowded, standard, motorcoach sightseeing tours of dead, physical monuments and ruins in that city.
 
So they devised a number of walking tours that brought participants to the lesser-known sights and activities that revealed important lessons about the culture, art, architecture and history of Rome. And they proceeded to enlist a team of graduate students, professors, scholars, and other academics (some with Ph.D.'s) in other cities to do the same. It is the high quality of these "private docents" (as Context calls them) that most distinguishes Context's art-heavy, architecture-heavy tours from the more casual walking excursions sometimes offered in the same cities.
 
Context, which the founders (Paul and Lani) now direct from their home in Philadelphia, is a thriving organization that enjoys a growing number of enthusiasts among intellectually-curious travelers. It limits its tour groups to six persons -- imagine that! -- and thus conducts its "Walking Seminars" (as it calls its tours) in a manner that respects the dignity, personality, and access-to-authenticity of participants, who usually pay a per-person fee of about $55 for a two-hour tour, $85 for a three-hour tour (less in New York, where a three-hour Art Galleries of Chelsea tour costs $65), for those experiences. It also will operate walking tours simply for an individual or couple for a flat fee.
 
Context has received every kind of award from organizations honoring innovators in travel, and it has certainly received a fair amount of press coverage. But more recently, it has inaugurated a new program called "Tours in the Public Interest" (you can find it by navigating through its website), financed in part by its own Foundation for Sustainable Tourism, on which tour charges are only $5, €5, or £5 per person. Sample topics: Thomas Jefferson in Paris, the Croton Aqueduct in New York. Since these new cut-rate experiences have scarcely been noticed to date, I'm highlighting them in this Blog.
 
And incidentally, if Context's normal charges seem high to you, then you haven't recently noted the average charges for a standard motorcoach tour in the cities where Context is active; they are, quite often, at least that much and more.
 
If you're planning a trip to any of the above 19 cities, you'll want to study Context's website (and Context requires that you make advance reservations for its unique tours).