Take your own Grand Tour... of National Trust properties

Thanks to the incredible collections of European curiosities, art, objects and inspirations, you can be a culture vulture without having to leave the country

- By Matt Nixson

DURING the 18th century, the Grand Tour was thought to be the best way to complete an upper-class education. Young aristocrats travelled to the continent, usually starting in Paris then moving south to Spain or Italy, where they visited ancient sites to learn about classical culture, grow in maturity and come back with polish and sophistication.

Travelling could be slow and dangerous. One Grand Tourist, the Second Earl of Enniskillen, took two days to travel by boat from Naples to Palermo - a journey which would take only an hour by plane today. The same tourist crossed the Alps on a mule though some travellers did this journey on a sedan chair, carried on poles by two porters.

Today many extraordinary objects - from paintings (including portraits - the selfies of their time) to books, documents, furniture and other curios are on display at National Trust properties. So while it's cold and wet, you can still get your culture fix - and there's no need to jump on a packed plane or brave the Channel Tunnel!

Copies of famous antiquities were popular Grand Tour souvenirs for the wealthy. One must-see statue was The Wrestlers - now in the Uffizi Gallery in Florence.

The statue shows two men engaged in "pankration", a contest with some similarities to wrestling and boxing. A life-size copy was probably bought by John Frederick Sackville, 3rd Duke of Dorset, during a lavish Grand Tour in 1769. You can see it at 600-year-old Knole House in Kent alongside one of the world's rarest collections of Stuart-era furniture, paintings and textiles.

Likewise, a little bronze boar, part of the collection at Belton House, Grantham, Lincs, is a miniature copy of a statue called Il Porcellino, now also housed in the Uffizi Gallery. There is another copy on a fountain in Florence, where tourists rub the boar's snout to ensure a happy return visit to the city.