Lonely Planet Spain: Travel Survival Kit

I like to know to "see" in a new place, but I also want to know the slightly funky and offbeat (loved the Erotica Museum in Barcelona). We had a great trip thanks to Lonely Plantet SPAIN.

I am amused by some of the comments made knocking this Lonely Planet Spain publication. Comments such as those indicating that their hotel was not listed show ignorance of the way I think this book is designed and intended. Spain is a large, historic and diverse country and visitors are there for equally diverse reasons. If one can only take one reference publication to cover the country, this is the book to take. I travel to small towns as well as larger metropolitan areas and I am amazed at the coverage provided in the text. Do I stay at their recommended hotels all the time? No, but I always check them out on-line before leaving home and some of them are the best I can find. Do I end up in places that do not appear in other guides? All the time and this book has never let me down. I find the book to to be well written and researched as is the Lonely Planet Italy by the same author. (For a really lame publication I'll refer you to Lonely Planet Switzerland!) If you are a Tourist visiting only large cities and magnet tourist spots, then other publications may have added value for you, but if you are a Traveler seeking out of the way venues in addition to the normal sights, then this is an excellent reference! . . . ignore the other whining commentators.

This book I found superior to competitors. Its maps were better and more detailed, allowing me to get aorund Madrid, Barcelona, Valencia and the little towns of ALgicerias and La Linia without any trouble. It is a wonderful book and also has a wide variety of places to stay unlike some guidebooks which only have the most expensive or the cheapest(and most savage) places to stay. I was very happy when I found myself alone in Madrid to have this book.

I buy an LP guide before every foriegn venture. I was in Spain last week and used my guide for hotel reservations and maps and restaurants and airline phone numbers in Spain. Then my "survival guide" dropped out of my bag on the streets of Madrid. I felt lost without it and there were many more times in that week that I missed it for reference. I highly recommend these guides. They are worth their weight in your back pack!

This book is an indispensable manual for an independent traveler. I was using it just about every minute when first time in Spain, unfamiliar with the local ways, language, food, prices and means of getting around. Lonely Planet's Spain covers much of those things and more. And its information is mostly very up-to-date, too.