Rick Steves' Travel Guides
Rick Steves' travel guides are written in an informed and candid style that many travelers know and appreciate.
These are user-friendly guidebooks that focus on good places to stay and eat. There are suggestions that fall within a range of budgets. Steves suggests itineraries and walking tours that include famous landmarks and little-known places.
The Steves guidebooks offer information on art galleries and museums, as well as street cafes and romantic neighborhoods. There are ideas for day trips and notes about various activities you can do and places where you can experience local nightlife. There are activities for kids and great places to go shopping. These books also have helpful reminders about when places are closed.
There are also tips on travel by train, subways and taxis. Steves lists various connections that can be made, how many are available each day, and about how long it takes to get to a destination. These things are all subject to change, of course, but you'll get a feeling for about how long it takes to travel to different places.
Steves uses his own triangle rating system which clues you in to what you should try to see and what you can miss. This can be especially helpful for planning family travel.
The Rick Steves travel guides contain sections on orientation and planning, with practical tips on money, sightseeing, transportation, entertainment, and how to avoid becoming a theft victim. He discusses when to travel and how to make priorities so you'll get the most out of your trip and be a smarter, more informed traveler.
The Steves travel guides are very popular and therein lies part of the problem. His recommendations can make an "off-the-beaten-track" location turn into a crowded tourist trap.
The books use simple hand-drawn black & white maps that may or may not be helpful. Most of the maps are not very detailed and
only provide a general idea about where things are located. It might be good to supplement these guidebooks with other maps that you can carry with you as you travel. Check out our maps section for recommendations on the best maps to carry with you as you travel.
The Rick Steves travel guides are interesting to read, but some find them lacking in updated information and details on transportation.
The advice and recommendations may be more useful for the novice traveler than for the more experienced globetrotter.
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