| Product: |
Lonely Planet in general |
| Date: |
03/01/05 (69 review reads) |
| Rating: |
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Advantages: Comprehensive
Disadvantages: Heavy
Increasingly these days people are choosing to travel independently and avoid the cattle herd mentality of the package tour. Numerous factors have influenced this change in consumer taste such as the plethora of travel programmes and cable channels, the availability of specialist sites on the Internet and not least cheap flights provided by budget airlines.
I have always tended to avoid the package deals in favour of arranging my own trip, in my student days it was because of the freedom it provides and nowadays it is a financial decision, as being a single parent with two children I refuse to pay the supplements that most travel companies apply to the cost of my holiday.
When planning a trip I always like to spend time researching my destination and I find travel books a great source of information, maybe it is a hang over from my student days but I still tend to opt for those aimed at the budget traveller as a source of information. The Lonely Planet range of books falls happily into this segment of he market and along with the Rough Guide series is up they’re as one of the market leaders.
This year will see us making two trips to Italy so it is the 6th edition of the Lonely Planet guide to Italy that I have most recently purchased.
Contents
The guide is very comprehensive indeed running to a total of 868 pages.
The opening chapters provide useful background to the destination including sections on the history and culture of the country, the environment and also information on the food and drink. For those planning to explore the whole country there are some useful itineraries that are set out as well as some options if you have a particular interest such as the cuisine or heritage sites.
The country is then divided up into distinct area with a chapter on each. Within each chapter you will find maps of the area and if it is a major city detailed maps of the city centre as well as a larger version showing the main areas of interest. To support the maps there is useful details on orientation and how to get around the area using public transport or by foot. There is a full list of local contact numbers to cover all emergencies and information requirements as well as guidance on areas that are not safe to travel in or where extra care is required.
Each section provides a wealth of information on the best attractions and museums to visit, on places to eat out, the best shopping and where the best nightlife can be found. Of vital importance are the sections detailing the accommodation options that range in price range from the budget hostels and camping to the top of the range establishments. For food accommodation and nightlife each establishment is clustered under budget, mid range and top end with a guide to the cost of each.
Towards the end of the book there are sections covering transport and health as well as a very useful guide to the language with useful phrases as well as a list of all the items you will find on a menu. Certainly making the effort or trying the local dialect is much better than the traditional English attempt at conversing, which is to say the English word with an Italian accent in an increasingly loud voice.
Advantages
What I particularly like about this guide is the fact that the writers have visited many of the places and the comments are set at a very personal level. There is a host of information to be found and in particular the guidance on booking accommodation and other useful websites has helped me save a lot of money for our trip to Rome.
In each of the chapters there are useful tips that are contained within boxes within the general text, these might be a particular recommendation for restaurant of guidance on how to get cheap tickets for an event.
On each of the maps there are a series of reference points which relate back to each individual hotel, restaurant or attraction which makes it easy to identify the location of each venue and how best to get there.
Disadvantages
The fact that the guide is so comprehensive does mean that it is quite heavy and unless you mark the pages that you need it can take time to find the section that you want.
Secondly being standard book size the maps are not always easy to use and could be set out a lot better especially when they cross over onto different pages.
Opinion
I would certainly have no doubts in recommending these guides, as the information is up to date and very comprehensive. The range of books is impressive and as well as offering traditional travel guides there is also a range of phrase books and more general travel advice.
At a rrp of £14.99 they are certainly not cheap however I prefer to have all the information to hand in one place rather than having to trawl through a number of different websites. On Amazon you can usually pick up old copies for about £10 in the new and used section.
To get more information check out the website at www.lonelyplanet.com.
Safe travelling.
Summary:
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