09 Dec Travel guides: What is the best option?
One of the fundamental steps before making a trip is of course choosing the guide. Travel guides will take us to know the best of the area that we are going to visit. For many forums, blogs, and travel portals that exist, paper guides continue to triumph.
It is not highly recommended to go with your laptop in Suriname or to be plugged into your mobile all day long. Fortunately, the guides in book format continue to enliven the long hours on the road. And the naps in the hostel’s bunk beds around the world.
Lonely Planet: Great For Making New Friends
For independent travelers, the leader in sales is undoubtedly Lonely Planet. It has a very simple format and is very easy to read. By using the word young, I also mean anyone who still feels like taking some good coach tuition and meeting young people like him in the hostels and places recommended in the guide.
The language is very direct and sometimes in the original versions uses a youthful slang difficult for the average English speaker to understand. The comments they tell us are 100% independent. In any case, the downside of Lonely Planet is that it has so many fervent followers that what it says goes to mass and by doing so it radically changes the future of the hostels or restaurants it touches. In Asia, there are many places where the Lonely Planet sign is larger than the name of the place itself. This undoubtedly causes the owners to take advantage and make them pay for their fame.
The Lonely Planet is undoubtedly the best for all those who want to make their first serious trip. For those who undertake a trip alone wanting to meet crowds of people in the same situation. Ideal for making friends.
Footprint: For Those Who Really Want To Escape The Usual Route
If you want to escape the main route, look for a Footprint. The quality of the guide depends on the country. They tend to look for secondary routes without losing an iota of the essence of the places and give a higher sense of escape than the Lonely Planet or the Globetrotter.
Delve deeper into history and art and remote towns. In addition, the directory with options for sleeping and eating tends to be more extensive. A negative point is that its format is not as user-friendly as Lonely Planet. Another is that maps tend to be a bit of a mess.
Perhaps it could be cataloged as a guide for all those who are tired of the route marked by the Lonely Planet. Some examples of Footprint masterpieces are Tunisia and India.
Rough Guide: A Good Backpacking Alternative
Within this section is the Rough Guide. I only used the one from India and it seemed to me that it used less hyperbole than Lonely Planet. Sometimes the latter get their mouths filled with bombastic adjectives when in the end there is no big deal.
Without being able to give much opinion on the Rough Guide due to my little experience with it, I would say that it is more similar to the Footprint style: Strength in history and art, search for a more personal style, and certain attempts to escape from the prescribed route by the queen guide.
Globetrotter: The French Bible
If you want to learn French, follow a Globetrotter. The fury caused by the Guide du Routard in the French country is incredible. I have known more than one who refused to go to a hostel or a restaurant.
In any case, the Trotamundos is another good option for trips with a limited budget and away from tourist tours. Its format is easy to follow like the Lonely Planet. I have only used two, so I will leave room for other travelers to comment more on it.
Travel Guides For City Breaks
Berlitz, Green Guide, and Michelin are ideal getaway guides. Weekends or entire weeks preferably in a city. They are specific in the places of visit and they help us to move in specific places without going as deep as the previous ones in the corners of the country.
There are many more travel guides that I do not know, so I open the season for you to comment on them and share with us which is your favorite guide!
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