By now, a typical University student is probably tired of walking.

One’s day may consist of trekking to dormitories on Alderman Road to visit friends, then to classes in New Cabell Hall on Central Grounds. Then it might be a 15-minute walk to the Aquatic and Fitness Center and then back home before going to the Corner for a late-night sub at Littlejohn’s — all in one day. Talk about blistered and hurting feet.

University students are not just tired of walking. They are sick of it.

And what exactly do they learn from all these walks — other than that University Transit Service buses should come more quickly? Certainly not that Thomas Jefferson’s godfather discovered the Cumberland Gap or that Turner Field, home of the Atlanta Braves, is made from Albemarle brick. Not that young Paul Goodloe McIntire, founder of the Commerce School, offered food to Yankee soldiers during the Civil War.

More than likely, one’s bandaged feet and futile cursing to the high heavens have led to very little information, if any at all.

Finally ready to fix all this ignorant stepping? Forgo one Saturday morning of sleeping-in to do something much more educational. Join the Walking Tours of Downtown Charlottesville to learn about 250 years of Charlottesville history during a 60-minute stroll around town.

Operated by the Albemarle Historical Society, the walking tours begin promptly at 10 a.m. Saturdays and 5:30 p.m. Thursdays, from early April through late October.

Tourists meet at the McIntire Building across from Lee Park, a one-acre square designed by early settler Thomas Walker, tour guide Joy Perry said. Walker was a legislator, surveyor, adventurer and Thomas Jefferson’s godfather, she added.

Perry, a retired schoolteacher from the Tidewater area, has been leading around Charlottesville tourists for 10 years. Only when her frayed and tattered tour tote wears out, the veteran story-framer and a current Albemarle County resident says, will she quit.

The streets of downtown Charlottesville may be full of tales of tragedy and triumph but they strangely lack curves. Walker, who arrived in Charlottesville in 1737, wanted everything in the city to be on a perfectly symmetrical “corner,” Perry said. For instance, Walker wanted an area of flat land near water for the location of the courthouse, she added.

The tour stops in front of the courthouse on Jefferson Street, whwich was constructed in 1803. Perry, walking quickly and far ahead of her audience, was on a mission to revive history in its fast-fading reality. Walkers followed because they did not want to miss a word. The courthouse, she explained, was set up so that the jury faces the defendant and the lawyers. Traditionally, the jury bench runs along the side of the room. Perry, once called to jury duty in this same courthouse, said she enjoys the set up. “It brings out the truth in all its glory,” she said, adding that the courthouse was formerly a gathering place where church services were held every Sunday, much to the delight of Jefferson, an avid Deist.

In fact, Jefferson Street, as Perry pointed out, should rightfully be named “Worship Street” because of the many churches that have lined the street at different points in time. In its entirety, the core of the downtown area is a total of 55 acres.

In 1832, the first synagogue was built in the place of the current public library. Because the Jewish religion prohibited followers from driving to services, the Jewish community set up its own village within walking distance of the synagogue, Perry said. Accordingly, the downtown area shops used to be run by multiple Jewish merchants. When Jews were forced to move their synagogue to Jefferson Street, they lined up along the road and moved the building brick by brick to its new home, Perry said.

Eschewing the long-held notion that history tours are typically about yawns and facts, Perry explained that she “likes to talk about people.”

“I hope you know I’m paraphrasing,” she said. Though you could almost imagine her amidst the whirring of time, sipping tea with Jefferson himself, “I don’t really know what he said,” Perry admitted.

Still, Perry never steers from her objective role as a presenter of history. A representative of the Albermarle Historical Society, Perry tries to remain as objective as possible. When offering her own interpretations of history, she covers her AHS badge, making it clear that she is giving her own personal opinion. Appearing to hang on her every word, 10 people participated in her walking tour last Saturday morning.

The walkers included a family who recently moved to Charlottesville and a couple visiting the city from Columbus, Ohio. Visitor Jennifer Connor said she enjoyed all the rich details of the ever-evolving architecture. Her two young girls, Alyssa and Amanda, cited the courthouse tour as their favorite stop.

Schoolchildren, tour organizer Jean Dooley said, can glean quite a bit of knowledge by taking the walking tours. Once a guide at James Monroe’s Ash Lawn-Highland, Dooley has organized the tours for the past 12 years. Dooley said around Halloween, there are “spirit walks,” where ghosts of residents past come out to share their stories of more history than horror. Like the other tours, the spirit walks are free of charge for large school groups. Customarily, the Albermarle History Society asks tourists and residents only for a voluntary donation of $5 at the conclusion of each tour.

A goal of the tours is to enhance the public’s understanding of Albemarle County, Dooley said. The hope is that University students will also come to learn about “their adopted home.”

Upon arriving in Geneva, I walked out of the airport and hailed a taxi. “18 Rue Muzy s’il vous plaît,” I said, secretly delighted at communicating my first phrase with a native. But instead of nodding and starting the meter like I expected, my driver turned around and smirked strangely. I was confused. Did I mix up the words and say something else? Was my accent really that pronounced? It was all that I could think about for the first 15 minutes of the trip before I was completely distracted by the gorgeous European city outside my window that was to be my home for the next four months. After swerving through a million skinny side streets and almost hitting a couple bikers, we arrived at the residence where the other 37 jet-lagged and shell-shocked students were dragging a semester’s worth of luggage up flights of stairs into a lovely Genevan townhouse.

During our orientation, Carla, the program director, explained the strange reaction of my taxi driver. “This beautiful residence,” she said, “used to be a brothel just last year. So ladies, please refrain from hanging off the balconies smoking cigarettes or they might think we’re back in business.” Great — well, at least it wasn’t my accent. The first 24 hours went by in a whirlwind of excitement and fatigue. Most of us hadn’t slept during the trip and while it was a sunny 10 a.m. in Geneva, we physically felt like it was still the middle of the night. As our resident adviser reminded us, “Sleep is for the weak!” Despite our exhaustion, we all put on strained smiles as we met the other students in the program and went around in first-year-like clusters on missions to buy prepaid cell phones and groceries. By evening, the hectic rush began to die down and we relaxed with a joint-effort pasta dinner. The students in the program are from all across the United States: Harvard, Stanford, Villanova, Boston University and many other colleges. Several of them, like me, are here to study public international law; however, some also came for the health policy program. As Geneva is the center of the United Nations, the International Red Cross and thousands of NGOs and IOs, it attracts many students interested in these two fields of policy.

The next couple days were spent getting acclimated to our new surroundings. We all tried our best to look like seasoned European travelers and not lost American tourists. Here are some of the tips I picked up: Put maps discreetly inside book covers, look super trendy and suave (but not like you’re trying too hard) and buy a miniature lap dog (as everyone has one here!). We also learned about key cultural differences, such as that it apparently is not acceptable to eat on the go in Switzerland — even Nutri-Grain bars!

To help us get our bearings, the program sent us on a scavenger hunt across the city. Stop 1: Place Neuve, a scenic park with life-size boards of chess and checkers. Our scavenger group was sidetracked by this attraction for more than an hour, especially after a little old French man challenged us to a game and then proceeded to annihilate us, despite our collective efforts. He repeatedly said, “Je vais vous donner un cadeau!” (I will give you a present!) and would pretend to give us an easy win, when really he was setting up a move that would wipe out half our board. Well, I suppose if the French can’t win wars, at least they can win board games.

After the chess humiliation, we went on to discover gorgeous Lake Geneva, where I scoped out real estate for my future life in which I marry a rich Swiss banker and live happily ever after. Eventually, we made our way to the Place de Nations, home of the UN headquarters and next to the International Red Cross. Our group went out for Swiss fondue to sample some local cuisine and came out fully satisfied — but slightly tipsy — as apparently the restaurants mix an unusually high concentration of wine into the fondue.

The first night of our arrival, our resident adviser ceremoniously handed us a list with all the city’s nightlife hot spots. “This list,” she said, “has been passed down from semester to semester of the Geneva Internship Program. Use it wisely.”

Our first destination was Club Platinum, which is a popular spot Wednesday nights because ladies not only get in free, but also receive free champagne the entire night. I was pleased to discover that my first Euro club experience lived up to my Mary-Kate and Ashley travel movie expectations. The DJ mixed European techno music with modern and old-school American music, creating a dizzying fusion of everything from Tiësto to Snoop Dogg to “Grease.” The room quickly filled up with gorgeous Swiss models, rich European businessmen and travelers from all around Europe and the wider world. Hearing multiple languages floating in the air and meeting people from every continent, at that moment I felt like a true citizen of the world.

After this adventure, we ended our night by going to the Water Jet on Lake Geneva, a popular landmark that was also conveniently located right next to our residence. At midnight, the jet is turned off and the water’s spray lingers in the air for about a minute before it is blown away into the night. Sitting in the peaceful calm of the mist, I had a chance to collect myself after the insanity of the past few days and recharge for the days in Geneva to come.

I have joined the Auckland University Tramping Club, which is far less risqué than it sounds. Its primary purpose is “tramping,” or the Kiwi term for hiking, although crafting baked goods seems to be a secondary endeavor. (As a side note, letters home that mentioned “Tramping Club Evening Dessert Parties” were met with much alarm in regards to my moral character.) The club, which organizes multi-day “tramps” through the New Zealand bush, mountains and snow, seemed to be both an easy social outlet and an opportunity to get poor-quality sleep in exotic places.

When it comes to the outdoors, I maintain a somewhat rugged self-perception. Thanks to a mutation on the Burris family genome for grotesquely enormous calf muscles, I can scamper up Humpback Rock or Old Rag with minimal effort. I love both scenic mountain views and mud, which lends well to most hikes, and my mind is neurotic enough to keep itself occupied during long stretches on the trail. But it took only one night of camping in New Zealand to enlighten me: I am, in fact, a total pansy.

New Tramping Club members are initiated through “May Camp,” a three-day stay in the Kaimai Range. Gorges and mountaintops are explored, trail mix is communally enjoyed and bonding inevitably occurs. Each initiate is requested to bring food, outdoor clothing and a sleeping bag. I packed enough peanut butter sandwiches to feed an elephant army and enough layers to clothe it but I suffered from a severe sleeping bag deficiency. The May Camp coordinator assured me that I would be fine with just a blanket instead, so I headed to the local discount store and picked up what I believed was a suitable alternative: a knock-off fleece Snuggie, complete with armholes and pockets. I immediately envisioned throngs of Tramping Club members lined up to catch a jealous glimpse of my “mobile sleeping bag.” Impressed by my own parsimony — especially since the said pseudo-Snuggie was on sale for $10 — I made my purchase and set off for camp.

The Tramping Club was mostly comprised of young Kiwi men, although a few females were scattered within the bunch. I had previously heard that the typical Kiwi guy was a scrappy young MacGyver, as skinny and tough as a steak at Golden Corral. When I first laid eyes on my fellow trampers, a forest of sinewy legs peeked out at me from muddy hiking boots. As I introduced myself, I wondered how I could dupe these hardy guys into liking me, an American blonde who had packed eyeliner in her rucksack.

Friendships were first cultivated during the breathtakingly beautiful day hikes. As I stumbled through places too beautiful to describe and too complicated to pronounce, my eyes greedily drank in the scenery as my brain unsuccessfully struggled to take in every meter. I can now confidently say that I have forgotten more beauty than most people will ever experience. It’s a humbling feeling.

Perhaps as astounding as the scenery, however, was the sociological landscape of the Kiwi Male. Weakness in the Tramping Club was taboo; injury was unheard of here. Complaining was a sort of treason, totally treacherous to the Kiwi Code. If I wanted to fit in with the Tramping Tribe, I decided, I had to follow suit. Not one complaint would emerge from my lips.

Night fell on the campsite, and everyone shared a hearty camp meal. Keeping up a tough girl façade had been surprisingly easy, since by that point my biggest complaints concerned blisters and sore muscles. By sunset though, I noticed that my breath had become visible and my hands were beginning to tingle. It was readily apparent that I had grossly overestimated both the temperature and my own hardiness. I watched as my fellow trampers slid into their insulated sleeping bags, while I grabbed my flimsy Snuggie. It appeared that my true Tramping Club audition was to take place well after the actual hike.

Several hours later, the boys all were sleeping deeply, burrowed in their nylon cocoons. I crossed my Snuggie-covered arms and drew in my legs to conserve heat, an aggravated roly-poly in a room full of enormous, snoring caterpillars. The temperature had dipped below freezing, and I lacked insulation from the bitter cold. In a feeble attempt to lull myself to sleep, and because sheep reminded me of the wool blankets I so sorely lacked, I counted reptiles basking in the sun. Several hundred lizards later, it was clear that sleep was an impossible goal. I stayed awake through the night, my body continuously shaking to warm itself.

The next morning, I shivered on a park bench, watching my fellow trampers slowly emerge from slumber. I was astounded; the Kiwi guys strutted by in T-shirts, shorts and flip-flops, happy and warm through some Herculean endothermic feat. I was sure at this point that I was not dealing with actual Homo sapiens. One guy was, inexplicably, even sitting and eating a bowl of muesli while wearing only a burlap sack.

“How’d you sleep, Snuggie girl?” one smiling, shirtless compatriot inquired. “Warmer night than expected, eh?”

I hid my fingers, which were blue up to the wrists, and replied, “Of course. Now let’s get going, boys. Hope you can keep up.”