Puerto Rico Off the Beaten Path

Noticing this book was a recent guide to Puerto Rico written by a woman, my wife insisted on buying it. We both enjoyed reading it for its combination of listings and colorful background notes. It makes you realize there is an island and culture worth exploring. We liked the descriptions that helped us better understand the way of life and why things are what they are. We decided to stay at smaller hotels where we heard Spanish and could eat local food. It let us appreciate what a fascinating and friendly place the island is. This book really did encourage us to get "off the beaten path."

The most helpful thing about this book was the lists of places to stay at the end of every region-discussion. Other than that, "Explore Puerto Rico, 5th Edition" had almost all the same sites & activities listed. For the sake of traveling lightly, we ended up not even bringing "Off the Beaten Path" with us, relying instead on "Explore Puerto Rico" (which has its own issues, see my review on that page for details).

Being born and raised in Puerto Rico,I thought I knew all the good places to visit. I bought this book with a little skepticism and what a wonderful surprise it was. The author definitely goes off the beaten path and the tourist traps. My husband and I just came back from there and the directions and the restaurants that the author mentioned were excellent.If you definitely want to explore the richness of the island and the diversified environments that it offers, this book is for you. I highly recommend it. We took it with us on our recent visit and we really had a very enjoyable time.

As a child, My wife lived in Puerto Rico for several years and thought she was familiar with the Island enough to not need another travel guide. We bought it anyway with a little reservation. Much to our surprise, what an AMAZING book! It gave us the best restaurants (not common tourist traps) to visit while traveling the Island, great maps to situate ourselves, and wonderful points of interest. To us it was invaluable!!! 5 stars!!! A must when traveling to PR. We loaned it to another couple that traveled to Puerto Rico last year, and they loved it too. I guess we will need to polish it off and pack it in our suitcase, since we are headed back next month.

If you're planning a trip to PR and you are interested in being more adventuresome than lying on the beach in San Juan, this book is a great resource. It covers several different trip options around the island. Had I not purchased it we would have never made it to the parts of the island which we did and would have had a far less enjoyable vacation. Also the restaurants that were hi-lighted were extremely helpful in making the trip more enjoyable.