Travel guidebooks and how to use them

Having just published my first not-a-guidebook travel book, I’ve been thinking about why we value the opinion of others, especially when it comes to travel.

Personally, I’d go for the one on the right – hey, I wrote it, I’m allowed!

After all, most people have a favourite guidebook series, and even the most tech-savvy traveller tends to have a tried and trusted paperback ‘bible’ stuck away somewhere in their bag.

We rely on these guides ‘to tell it like it is’, or at least help us out in our chosen destination. We take the guide’s word for it, we rely on the writer’s recommendations, and plan our itineraries according to their suggestions. Guidebooks then are useful, insightful, helpful and informative – but they can also be infuriating, misleading, out of date and sometimes just plain wrong.

I should know, I’ve written dozens of editions of Rough Guides over…