5 comments about The Wee Mad Road: A midlife escape to the Scottish Highlands.

1. A great story about a middle-aged couple who were not afraid to leave their comfortable life and find a new life in an out-of-the way place.
   Very entertaining. A real life adventure.



2. What a wonderful adventure in living. How delightfully written and beautifully illustrated. It's really about the Maloney's romance with the Highland village of Coigach, whose climate and living conditions that would try the patience of a flagellant. The generally loveable inhabitants would do justice to a 60s Peter Sellers film. The tale of the lovesick ewe is worth the price of admission.
   This book almost makes me want to go to Scotland and live the experience myself. However, I think I will resist the temptation, sit in my favorite chair and let the Maloneys do it for me; they do it so well.



3. I have found with the books that I really love that I stop reading them with 30 or so pages left. I just don't want to finish them beause I don't want them to end. Then I laugh at myself for being silly and finally read the last pages. This was one of those books. I really didn't want it to end. Once I finished it I couldn't decide whether I should start reading it again or just book my ticket to Scotland. I honestly laughed and cried while I read this and feel as though I now know the whole village of Achiltibuie.



4. Wow! I felt like I was there. I have been to Scotland before, but not quite that far northwest. Now I see what I missed. The Frieda chapter was priceless! It was nice to read both authors' comments. It gave a well rounded picture of the people and terrain of the area. I felt as though I were there. The writing is so vivid, that I felt the wind and cold rain. The life the authors had is quickly dying, and it was wonderful that they were able to take that time in their life, to live a somewhat slower pace, where you had time to "smell the flowers" and appreciate their neighbors. The pictures were excellent as well, and easily showed Scottish life and scenery.



5. I read about this book in the St. Paul(MN)Pioneer Press
   
   We have a Scottish daughter-in-law. We went to visit her parents on the Isle of Skye after she married our son. I fell in love with Scotland, especially the Highlands.
   
   I ordered this book for my daughter-in-law for her birthday and she was delighted with it. She knew the location of Coicagh, had been there and knew how to pronounce it. I picked the book up at our library and am enjoying it immensely. Anyone born in Scotland or it was their birthplace, can't help but identify with these Highland Scots: Warm, generous, patient with Americans, especially. To me Scotland could be heaven and I would be satisfied.

5 comments about Frommer's Europe by Rail (Frommer's Complete).

1. Not a safe bet, this European rail guide offers a strange mix of up-to-date and completely out-of-date information. It also tries to do too much, providing page after page of hotel, restaurant and museum listings by city but only a page of two of specific rail tips by country. The guide pushes Eurailpasses, as is to be expected from a publication endorsed by Rail Europe, the main stateside pass vendor.
   
   Points to watch out for...
   
   The guide is too optimistic about reservations and supplements. As the various continental railways move toward inevitable privatization, more and more premium services are being introduced. Most of the trips that tourists are likely to take will require reservations and supplements, in addition to Eurailpasses.
   
   The guide doesn't give point-to-point tickets a fair shake, listing full prices and only the most basic discounts. For example, SNCF's "Prem's" specials (advance purchase online tickets to French and international destinations) aren't mentioned. For many tourists, these specials would make point-to-point tickets cheaper than Eurailpasses.
   
   The guide lists only expensive, tourist-class hotels. I didn't see a single listing below 100 Euros in Paris, for example. There are many excellent, if humble, hotels throughout Europe. Use the Web to get current hotel information.
   
   My favorite example of out-of-date information in the guide has to do with the regional express train ("RER") from Roissy Charles-de-Gaulle aiport to Paris. The guide lists both first and second-class ticket prices, even though the first-class designation disappeared years ago.



2. I found this guide very useful in plotting out where I wanted to go, how to get there, and what to visit. It was also nice to know about the student discounts at various attractions. I didn't use it for the hotel recomendations, and I used a few of the restaurant ideas, which were usually excellent choices. I traveled all over Europe (12 countries) using this book, the maps provided, and my Eurail. It was helpful in figuring out the ferry options to get from Western Europe to Scandinavia as well. I definately recomend this book to anyone traveling to Europe, as I found it very easy to use as well as useful.



3. I paid half of what I normally would pay for this book in our school book store. Didn't even notice that is was slightly used. Received it quickly.



4. A very well written guide for anyone traveling in Europe. The "Fast Fact" sections are very helpful for getting a feel for the different countries and places of interest. The maps are great, especially, if your knowledge of European geography is weak.
   This book is fun and easy to read.



5. In trying to decide which book to get for traveling around Europe for a few months by rail, I looked through this book, Let's Go Europe 2008, Rick Steves Best of Europe 2008, and Europe by Eurail 2008. The latter of these was broken down into sections devoted to major cities, and day trips by train from those cities, which seemed too much like a trip organizer for me. Rick Steves didn't really include the practical point-to-point info I was looking for. Let's Go Europe was comprehensive, but the city maps just weren't that clear.
   
   At the beginning of each chapter (one per country), there's a map of the whole country, then in each city's subsection is a map of the city center with the train station clearly marked. There's a paragraph on each city's train station information, followed by information elsewhere and how best to get around the city. This is important to me, as I wanted a book that'd help me get my bearings upon arriving in a city. Let's Go is similarly formatted, and I think Fodor's is too, but this was the only one with this format geared specifically toward rail travel that I came across. This book also includes a nice laminated tear-out rail map, but I bought a separate map with more detailed city-to-city schedule info, and am also supplementing with timetables from eurail.com.
   
   Before buying this, I had read the review mentioning that there's some out-of-date train ticket info in this book, but I feel like that's a risk you run with any book. It's true, though, that this book alone won't give one a clear understanding of specific ticket options and prices. Europe by Eurail gave a better explanation of these; you may want to glance over it in a store, or just visit www.ricksteves.com/rail or wikitravel.org/en/Eurail.

3 comments about Secret London: Exploring the Hidden City, With Original Walks And Unusual Places to Visit.

1. I love this book! It has detailed instructions to find (and history of) little known spots in London that are marvelous. There are several color pictures and hand-drawn maps to help guide you on your walk.

   Some of the fascinating bits of London that you can track down with this book are the rooftop gardens in Kensington, the underground tube stations that are no longer used and the rivers that have been tamed and paved over but still peek out here and there.

   Even long-time residents will find new insight into their favorite city. Every time I go to London I search out one thing from this book and I'm always glad I did. For tourists, if you bring this book and an A-Z, and a copy of the latest Fodor's or Eyewitness, you won't want for anything else.




2. One of the outstanding "Interlink Walking Guides" series, Secret London: Exploring The Hiddin City: Exploring The Hidden City, With Original Walks And Unusual Places To Visit is a travel guide especially for the walking tourist determined to explore the greatest sights of London, including obscure treasures such as rivers long buried, ancient buildings, and sites where anyone can enjoy free lectures. Full-color photographs, extensive descriptions, street maps clearly illustrating the route of the walk, contact and opening time information, and much more fill this handy travel guide for the visitor who wants to see it all.



3. Very interesting book. I haven't read all of it but what I have read was great. I am using it for research at this time and will hope that in the future that I get the chance to visit all I am reading about. Good for the money!

5 comments about The Most Beautiful Villages of Provence (Most Beautiful Villages).

1. Provence is heaven to me.I love the hills, the variety of plant life, and the exquisite villages with their definitive shuttters and dove cotes. The fountains bubble with life. The cobbled streets lead to some of the most fetching homes and buildings in the world. The Provencal people dress their windows in lace and paint the exterior and interior of their homes in the colors found in the Provencal landscape: blue, yellow, ochre, greens. Terracotta roofs provide the most wonderful color and texture to the landscape. Somehow everything blends wonderfully! The creators of The Most Beautiful Villages in Provence capture the essence of this southern region of France. The photography vividly presents the viewer with a panorama of gorgeous scenes: fields of lavender, geraniums in pots leading to a beautiful door, roof top views that are breathtaking, undulating paths that take you to splendid spots, aerial views of villages, an old roman road and bridge. A friend of mine, who was born in Provence, gave me this incredibly beautiful book; the only thing better, she says, is to be there! I plan to take this book with me to Provence next summer!! After seeing this book, nothing can keep me away!



2. I am French and was born in Provence, so I have spent most of my days there, except when I travel and when I was modeling in the world of high fashion. I know every village, and I fly my plane over Provence many, many times. I bought this book because it is so beautiful and shows the many wonderful places in my part of France. I am not good at taking the pictures, like these men do, and besides, I always do the flying. My sister would have to do the picture making. If you buy this book, you will be able to see my beautiful Provence in the pictures whenever you want to. Provence is very old and very picturesque, that is why the photography is so good. If it was not a most beautiful place in the world, it could not be so beautiful of a book. I am French and so I know it is this beautiful. It is more beautiful in the real world, if you can even think that. We have lots of cobble streets. Everyone loves the flowers, so you will see most beautiful flowers everywhere you look in Provence. We have hidden waters that come out into our special fountains. Every village must have their fountains and some are very, very old and are more special than any place else in the world. We like things to be beautiful, so you never see anything ugly in Provence. The earth is very good to us. We have herbs growing everywhere in the countryside. Lavender, Rosemary, and Thyme, you can find just walking in our wonderful hills. We love colors in Provence. Blue, yellow, ochre,green, we like all of those colors. Marcel Pagnol lived in Provence, too. He made his films and his books because he loved Provence. He was French. If you want to see a beautiful book that will make you smile and smile, get this book, and then come see for yourself that I am lucky to be French and live in Provence most of the time...................... ................Presented to you by Summer



3. I bought this book thinking that it would show me not only nice pictures, but also information about the villages it supposedly considers the most beautiful ones in Provence. Pure disappointment... Even though the quality of the pictures is nice, they do not give you a true view of the relevant villages. They are pictures taken at random that do not represent - sometimes - the best view of the village.
   
   But what is most dissapoiting in this book is the poor information about the villages, its populations, culture and location. In my opinion, every descrition of each village should also contain a map of its location in southern France (for us to know how could one get there), its population (to see how big it is), a some info on the villages picturesque points, etc. The few paragraphs dedicated to each village are too vague.
   
   Finally, I think the editor should have made this book differently with half the villages and twice the pictures and info about them. I gave 2 stars for the pictures.



4. I love this book! It effectively captures the drama and charm of Provence. I have been to Provence and this book is the next best thing if you can't go there. I also highly recommend the other book "The Most Beautiful Country Towns of Provence".



5. France is one of my favorate places to visit and the book has picked a few of the places I have visited. Great Book to own.

2 comments about Frommer's Croatia (Frommer's Complete).

1. The book was very imformative and helpful. I referred back to it daily on my trip.



2. There are not too many Croatia guide books out there that are up-to-date. Most of the restaurant information and hotel information was accurate. There were a few places that no longer existed (this is a May 2006 version and I was in Croatia in October 2006). My biggest complaint about this book was the lack of maps. There were no good city maps to help you get around. If you want some basic information about Croatia and what to see this is a good guide. But if you need more help in selecting places to stay, what to eat, how to get there and what you are looking at this isn't the guide book for you.

1 comments about Top 10 London (Eyewitness Top 10 Travel Guides).

1. Excellent source of information. Well organized book with maps for each section. Fold out maps on each cover with a pull-out in back are all very helpful. It came in especially handy while planning the trip but was also useful while there. Small enough to fit in your jacket or bag.

5 comments about Czech & Slovak Republics (Country Guide).

1. I bought this book because I couldn't find the Prague book in time (I live in France). Plus I like more of a country history instead of just city history. As an experienced traveler, I can say that overall this book is good. It's hotel suggestions must have been good because they were all full. The maps were very nice. The restaurant suggestions were great. Only a few complaints: It didn't tell us that the castles are closed on Mondays (we found out when we saw the big CLOSED sign on the castle). Also there is not much info on tipping. The book said 5-10% yet EVERY restaurant added at least 20%. I got the impression the book hadn't been really updated since the previous version.



2. Sadly, I ran out of time to explore the Slovak Republic, something I hope to do the next time I go into Eastern Europe. So I can only attest to the Czech republic portion of this book. I found it extremely useful, especially in planning my trips outside of Prague, though it does contain a good portion about Prague. One of the best suggestions was to include a visit to Litomerice after the somber tour of Terezin. I didn't take the advice on booking ahead on my trip to Cesky Krumlov and spent about an hour finding a place to stay and I went late May. Not speaking any Czech beyond hello and thank you, I had a lot of trouble with the Czech train system, especially outside of Prague. I found the bus system to be better than the Czech train system since you could buy a ticket on the bus as you boarded and the bus drivers were friendlier to me than the ladies at the ticket windows at the Main Train station in Prague and in Cesky Budjovice (where my train to Cesky Krumlov was early and I didn't understand when it showed up, so I took a bus instead) Either way, it is extremely inexpensive to travel around the country, so at the very least take a few day trips outside of Prague, if not longer trips. I was lucky this new edition came out months before my trip. Another great guidebook by Lonely Planet. As for an earlier review, Prague Castle counts as a museum, so its closed on Mondays.



3. Just returned from the Czech & Slovak Republics and found this book invaluable. Excellent, correct descriptions of localities. Useful to those of us who drove the country and trained too. The mini phrase section is all you need, so don't buy a separate phrasebook. Those going to Prague should also buy the DK travel guide for that city which is excellent and colorful.



4. As always. I've been using Lonely Planet Guides from time ago and I think that they are one of the best (if not the best) travel guides you can afford.



5. I have used LPGs for years, and many travelers like myself are older people. Lately the LPGs font size has gotten very small and really hard to read, probably to save money.
   Make the fonts readable for older people, even if the product becomes larger and a little more costly. This applies to all recent LPGs I have bought. Guides are not helpful if you have to struggle to read them. This is particularly true with maps. Last month I gave my daughter in her 40s a guide for Ireland, and her first comment was "I can hardly read it". However, your content, as usual, is exceptional.

5 comments about City Walks: Paris: 50 Adventures on Foot.

1. I didn't get this box of walks until my second visit to Paris and now would make a point of buying these cards for any holiday destination.
   Choose 3 walks (they generally all form a daisy chain) and make a day of it.
   Easy to follow maps without over-burdensome commentary. Who wants to spend their nose in a book while walking? A few highlights per walk that you can make your own, or skip.



2. What a great idea...the cards give you a walking tour w/o the hassle of a walking tour. You can take your own pace, decide where to stop and for how long, and you dont have to pay $70 per person for each walk! We jotted down ideas from several cards and took about four of them with us. The information on the back and the map on the front were equally valuable. An especially great tool for "first timers" that don't want to only see the tourist side of paris.



3. These cards give you great ideas for exploring different neighborhoods and places to stop along the way. But you need to be careful that the directions are correct. I went through about 20 cards (combined walks each day). And each day there was a card with a slight, but important, error in it: the path on the map was drawn incorrectly, street names were incorrect, or the written direction said to go down a street when really you needed to go up the hill. They're useful and I recommend them, but just make sure you have another map with you in case you get a bit lost. But getting lost can be half the fun of exploring a new city.



4. Having just returned from a visit to Paris, we found these cards to be marginally helpful and interesting to us. Each of the 50 cards contains a map on one side and text on the other, and each walk contains information of historical and architectural interest as well as some merchant and restaurant suggestions. this sounds good on paper, and I found the cards to be useful when planning our days, but by necessity the text was really short on facts and too long on merchants. I think this could be useful but if you really want a walking tour, you'd be better off getting something more lengthy and detailed. the cards are handy for throwing in your pocket, but not all streets are marked.



5. I liked the size of these cards - they were easy to carry around and refer to. I also liked the fact that they don't just cover the usual spots. There are some nice out of the way streets and locations to explore in this deck.

5 comments about Ghosts of Spain: Travels Through Spain and Its Silent Past.

1. A British journalist who has lived 20 years in Spain, married and raising his 2 children in Madrid, the author investigates, reveals and muses upon Spanish culture, history and the forces of the "two Spains" as they come together, or rub against each other, in forming the modern Spanish world. A fascinating look at Spain, its subcultures from the Basques to the Catalans to flamenco to the Galicians, to drug culture to tourism and the very difficult and delicate process of choosing to forget the differences of the Spanish Civil War and Franco's regime in order to move forward in a country that was once the most powerful on earth.
   I like Spain and its history. This is one of the very best insights into modern Spain. Highly recommended.



2. If you have time to read only one book about Spain, Ghosts of Spain, would be my pick for you. I have been to Spain several times: to Valderama for the Ryder Cup; to the Pyrenees to hike; to Barcelona to see Gaudi's works; to Bilbao to see "Puppy" and the Gehry Guggenheim; and to Guernica because of Picasso's painting of the same name. There is little in Spain that hasn't captured my interest. Ghosts of Spain has pulled together my varied experiences and has made sense of them. Ghosts is rich with history, pre- and post Franco, and with a devoted admirer's unravelling of modern Spain's political, economic, artistic, and social sensibilities. Read Ghosts and you will arrive in Spain to find that Giles Tremlett has given you an amazing gift, a "Rosetta Stone" for Spain. Whether you speak Spanish or not, Tremlett's Ghosts will make the new and the strange feel familiar. If you already know Spain, I suspect that Ghosts is even more of a "must read."



3. I wanted to learn more about Spain and the format of this book seemed ideal but the writer has a dull style that makes it hard to get through the book. It's repetitive; he uses the most hackneyed phrases and it sounds like a "What I did last summer" composition from a pretentious high schooler. It's neither a detailed history nor a good journalistic read.



4. Nice follow up after reading the classic Iberia by James Michener. Brings the reader up to date on life in modern Spain which is still haunted by ghosts of its civil war and the battle between tradition and modernism. La Transicion, or Spain's transition to democracy is something that is occuring both historically, politically, and personally as Spain enters a more globalized, connected world. Tremlett describes this "transicion" from all perspectives, but it is his personal perspective, as an ex-pat Brit raising his family in Spain, which I found particularly enjoyable. His descriptions of day to day life juxtaposed into chapters dealing with deeper historical and political events, such as the aftermath of the Spanish Civil War, the legacy of Franco, the Basque separatist movement, the pride of Catalans, and the 2004 Islamic bombings, makes this book very readable and pertitent to truly understanding not only the country but its people, and their remarkable history.



5. As a regular visitor to Spain who unfortunately hasn't had much luck mastering the language, I've scoured bookstores and websites in order to learn everything I can about the the history and culture of this amazing country. Many of the books available are not very comprehensive, or dry to the point of being boring. Most books in English you buy in Spain (translations) are almost unreadable, and clearly not edited by native English speakers. Ghosts of Spain has got a ton of information...and insight, and it's very readable. I highly recommend it for anyone with casual interest, or for "Span-o-files" like myself.

2 comments about Greek: Lonely Planet Phrasebook.

1. We are getting married in Greece next summer and this phrasebook has helped me remember so many of the Greek words & phrases that I will need to know. I already know how to speak & read Greek, but this is an excellent refresher. It is a small book that you can take with you everywhere. Definitely recommended.



2. This is certainly an incomplete book but, if you bought it as I did for a few Greek words or phrases, it's well worth it. It does give you a flavor for the Greek language too and you might notice trends in the speech. Organization doesn't seem to be its strong point so it's hard to find things in but, even if you find only a few things, it's done something. The book makes absolutely no pretension to teaching you the Greek language.