It was the best of times, it was the worst of times; it was a time to find new experiences overseas, it was a time to miss the comforts of home. It was the age of discovery. Everything lay before us, but we didn't know what to expect on the journey.

So it was for the eight students in Michael Pearson's summer-session travel writing class, a study abroad program that took the group to Europe in May. Our goal: to learn the ingredients that go into travel writing, a genre of nonfiction so wide as to include everything from Chaucer's "The Canterbury Tales" to Mark Twain's "Life on the Mississippi," and to fashion stories of our own that capture the essence of the trip and our experiences as innocents abroad.

Those stories would be tales of two cities - London and Paris - and then some. We also spent time in Edinburgh, the capital of Scotland, and York, an ancient Viking stronghold in western England, during the two-week journey.

The travel writing seminar was one of approximately 10 faculty-led study abroad programs sponsored this year by the Office of International Programs' study abroad division. The program was designed by Pearson, an experienced travel writer himself, and Steve Johnson, study abroad director.

This was Pearson's second consecutive travel writing seminar abroad. Last year, the goateed English professor and his students went to some of the same locations. Edinburgh was added this time to spice things up a bit, he said. Another such trip is ina the works for next summer, with Amsterdam being added to the itinerary.

"If the root meaning of the word education is a 'leading out,'" Pearson said, "then this kind of activity is the ultimate educational experience where learning and experience converge."

The class departed Norfolk May 7 and flew overnight to London, where members were greeted by cheery guide Nigel Hake for a morning tour of the city. We watched the changing of the guard ceremony at Buckingham Palace from a vantage point often neglected by tourists and were treated to fabulous views of the Houses of Parliament and Big Ben from across the River Thames.

Other London activities included attending a performance of Shakespeare's "King Lear" at the Globe Theatre, a reconstruction of The Bard's 16th-century outdoor showplace, and the occasional "educational tour" of one of the city's many quaint public houses, or pubs.

For Kyle Kuhn, a second-year master of fine arts student from Norfolk, the highlight of the trip was climbing a series of towering stairs to the "Whispering Gallery" inside the dome of St. Paul's Cathedral, where schoolchildren far away on the other side of the massive structure could be heard whispering to each other.

"It was a really great opportunity," Kuhn said. "A different perspective about America is what you learn after being away."

With London as home base, the group also took side trips to Shakespeare's birthplace at Stratford-Upon-Avon, Oxford University and Canterbury.

The next stop was Edinburgh, a five-hour train ride through rural Northern England and along the rugged and dramatic North Sea coast into Scotland.

Fields of rapeweed, which made riotous patches of yellow in the quilted countryside from our vantage point on high as we flew into England, were gradually replaced along the tracks by golden, cauliflower-like tufts of prickly gorse, as we traveled northward into Scotland.

Among the passengers, the quaint British accent also gave way to the vigorous burr of the Scots, evident in the clutch of schoolgirls whose lively conversation about former Spice Girl Geri Halliwell's autobiography and a sex column in a glamour magazine drew the Americans' attention.

Once in Edinburgh, the group enjoyed exploring the city's "Royal Mile," which Defoe called "the largest, longest and finest street for buildings and number of inhabitants, not only in Britain, but in the world, and Edinburgh Castle, the fortress that sits atop a dormant volcano overlooking the city, guarded by the statues of William Wallace and Robert the Bruce of "Braveheart" fame.

After a stop in York, we rode a Eurostar train from London to Paris via the English Channel Tunnel. Arriving at night, we ascended the Eiffel Tower and took in a magnificent view of the bejeweled City of Light.

For all of the scheduled sightseeing the group enjoyed, it was an abortive trip to the Palace of Versailles that turned out to be a highlight for Chelley Merrell of Virginia Beach, an M.F.A. student who already has both a bachelor's and master's degree from Old Dominion. She was forced to turn back when a friend lost his passport as the group boarded a train to the palace, but ventured out later on her own.

"What an incredible journey, getting lost on the way to Versailles and finding really friendly and helpful people," Merrell said. "It was an incredible opportunity, an adventure."

For aspiring travel writers, that, in fact, was what they were after: firsthand experiences to add some human interest to their narratives.

As part of the seminar, students are required to write one or more papers about their experiences, and Pearson encourages them to fashion their work into a publishable account. Janet Meyer, for example, a part-time graduate student and an adjunct faculty member in the English department, plans to write a piece on the image Americans have of the British (prim and proper) and the more down-to-earth reality, Pearson said.

"It is not a requirement to publish. It's just a high hope. Evaluation is based upon the creativity and professional quality of the story or stories that people come up with," he noted. "Really, what we're reaching for is a good narrative - what we'd be striving for in any writing class."

Pearson also uses other other criteria in determining whether the course met his expectations.

"I judge its success by the wide-eyed wonder in the eyes of those who go and the enthusiasm in those same individuals as they lug their bags back after two weeks in London, Paris, etc.," he explains.

"Each day I remember something wonderful that happened - something I saw or heard or experienced. There are few courses that make me reflect over and over again as the days and months go by - this one always does - and I know that it does the same for the students because they call, or write or visit my office over the year to tell me so."