When reading old novels and travel logs up to a century ago, the main difference is that people took their time. Travelling often took days or weeks, but it was okay since there was no alternative, and since enjoying the journey was sometimes a part of the process. It's amusing to read about trains that stopped for 2 hours so that passagers could go out for lunch. Trains and boats were places were you lived and met people.

Since travelling was slow, people had to adapt. From Paris, a bourgeois family could spend a day or two in the neighboring countryside, but if they wanted to visit Italy or Russia, you'd stay there for a few months. Nowadays, it's the same: from Paris, a middle class family can spend the week-end at Tunis, but they will take two weeks of holidays for Thailand. Yet our time-constrained lives have made months-long stays less frequents.

What you're missing is the vast majority of people simply never traveled any real distance from their hometown at all. Spending a few months visiting Italy sounds lovely, but most people have always been too time-constrained for that kind of luxury.