1 comments about Spain from a Backpack (From a Backpack Series).

1. I received a copy of this book recently from a friend who knows that it is one of my life's goals to visit Spain. Being that the book is small and an easy read, I bumped it to the top of my reading list.
   
   Normally, when planning a trip to another country we buy a travel guide to aid us in finding those well known (and maybe not so well known) places that are must sees for you trip. This book, however, gives you first hand accounts from travelers to different areas of Spain. The topics cover trips to Barcelona, Pamplona, Madrid, Valencia and more. Some of my favorites include a tale of unexpected romance (Running For the Boy) in Pamplona; a horrifying yet funny trip to the beach (What I Learned About Coleoptra By Having a Few Climb Up My Shorts) in Andalusia; and using conversational English to aquire a free trip to a village outside of Madrid (Talking My Way Into Spain). The stories give you a view of Spain from the travelers that a travel guide will not.
   
   I recommend this collection of stories for the would-be traveler as a supplement to the usual travel guides one tends to buy for their trips.

3 comments about Forty Day Trips from Rota: Easy Adventures in Southern Spain.

1. I have been in the area for a little over a year and it has been a great investment. My family and I have enjoyed countless hours on the road with this book. Very detailed and easily translated. I would recommend this book for anyone who is looking to be Stationed or even looking to retire in the Area. Thanks for the Great Memories.



2. I have been stationed in Rota, Spain, and buy a copy for those family and guests before they come so they have an idea of what they would like to do.
   All trips are easy an well layed out.
   My family uses it a last minute planner for the weekends. We can not decide what to do.. We just pick up the book and take a pick.
   Most of what Southern Spain has to offer is covered with few omittions. Written down to earth and simple.



3. This is an excellent book to have on hand if you are moving to Rota.
   We put this in our carry-on luggage and thought of all the fun things we could do when we finally arrived to Spain.
   The book has become very useful. It gives specific instructions how to get around, but I would also recommend visiting the towns "Department of Tourism", they will give you a detailed map.

5 comments about Fodor's Spanish for Travelers (Phrase Book) (Fodor's Languages for Travelers).

1. I picked this up before a trip to Guadalajara, and it really came in handy. It was simple to use and full of exactly the words I was looking for. I practiced with the cassettes on the plane, and then I brought the phrasebook everywhere - shopping, sightseeing, eating out, and (unfortunately) to the pharmacy for, um, an emergency. It even helped me there, although I wish the situation to test that particular area of usefulness hadn't come up. Really a great buy and a fantastic way to stretch those two years of high school Spanish I barely remember.



2. The audio with this book has useful phrases that would be great to learn before your trip, however the phrases are spoken to quickly for a beginner to learn. Also, the format is inconsistent. In the beginning they start off first giving you the word/phrases in english followed by spanish. Then, without any warning, it changes to giving you the spanish word first and then the english. This makes learning even more difficult. This is not a good program for beginners. Maybe if you have taken spanish classes and know some basic spanish vocabulary, grammer, and phonics then this would be a helpful review. If you are a beginner like me with one semester in college completed years ago this program is not for you.



3. I'll get straight to the point: Do NOT buy this unless you have a basic, solid knowledge of Spanish already.
   This CD set is comprised of phrases, first said in Enlish, then repeated in Spanish. The Spanish pronunciation is difficult to understand without the book in front of you- which is confusing to follow.
   This CD set does not teach grammar, pronouns, tenses, etc. It only teaches phrases- complete sentences.
   In order to benefit from this set, you will need to already understand some basic verbs and pronouns (gender and formalities) or you will become lost very quickly.

   This CD set is only good if you need to quickly memorize phrases for traveling- but remember, you will also need to UNDERSTAND what people say to you. It's better to learn the basic language skills than to memorize, "Where is the bus station?" and realize you have no idea what the response means!

   I recommend starting with a "Teach Yourself Spanish" course first. That will give you a good foundation.




4. I have this book and several other Spanish language books. This is the best of the lot. It has a dictionary of most common words, a useful phase section with pronunciation and useful information about Spain and Latin America. It is worth every bit of the price. Es muy bueno.



5. My husband and I travelled to Spain for our honeymoon knowing very little Spanish (cerveza, por favor and gracias were basically it). This book helped us to communicate with ease. The book is organized by situation to allow you to find stuff quickly, and also includes a small dictionary. Its small size made it easy to carry with us everywhere. We also carried the Living Language Spanish-English dictionary to help us translate specific words, but to put them in phrases that actually made sense we used this book. We will definitely buy other phrasebooks by Fodor's for our next trip.

No comments about Karen Brown's Spain: Charming Inns & Itineraries 2004 (Karen Brown Guides/Distro Line).

No comments about The Portuguese: The Land and Its People (Aspects of Portugal).

No comments about Barcelona Access.

No comments about National Geographic Traveler: Portugal (National Geographic Traveler).

4 comments about Grammar Lessons: Translating a Life in Spain (Sightline Books).

1. Not since Tobias Wolffe's This Boy's Life have I been so moved by a work of nonfiction. Ms. Morano's economical prose, keenly observed detail and emotional honesty are a triple-threat. The essays work that magic of translating what your imagination conjures into an experience which you feel is now a genuine memory, something about which you and she have secret and sacred understanding. Everyone who has had their heart broken by their crazy boyfriend while travelling through Spain should read this book, and then everyone else should too, because after a glass of madeira or a cup of cafe con leche your mind might trick you into reminiscing about that year in Spain when your crazy boyfriend ...



2. The book was delivered before the estimated delivery date. The book was in the stated condition- good.



3. I loved every essay in this book. Beautifully written. Insightful. Entertaining. Thought provoking. Brilliant but never pretentious.



4. In Grammar Lessons, Michele Morano takes the reader on an unforgettable journey, a treat to the senses. She invites us to explore her thoughts and feelings as she experiences daily life in Spain in the early 1990's, while teaching English at the University of Oviedo for a year. While in Oviedo, she enrolled in a Spanish language course for foreigners or "extranjeros."
   
   In thirteen personal essays, Morano captures the reader's heart with her descriptive and poetic style. Her themes evoke a feeling of familiarity, for her stories are organized around topics such as food, travel, and solitude versus loneliness. "I'm hungry in both body and spirit," she writes. "I crave not just a meal, not just the take-out supper I can carry to the emptiness of my room, but a complete dining experience." One pressing issue during the year in Spain was her longing for the man she left behind in New York.
   
   Morano prefaces her book by explaining that grammar is not simply words strung together to form sentences, but the mannerisms, gestures, and ways of life that accompany language. The book is organized into three parts. The essays in Part One reveal her struggle to learn the Spanish language while living the culture. The essays in Part Two revolve around her later trips to Spain. Part Three reflects her attitude toward travel along highways and how it shapes the individual. Morano's sentiments about travel and saying farewell to relationships are reflected in these lines:
   
   "If you move about in the world, if you live fully and fall in love--with friends, acquaintances, and places and periods of time, your heart is going to break again and again. Each time you say good-bye, you'll feel the ache of impermanence, of inevitability, of your own finite days."
   
   I connected with this book because I would have benefitted greatly from studying in foreign lands while I was studying Spanish as my college major. However, overseas travel and study programs were not as prevalent in the late 70's or early 80's as they are now. I have since made many excursions to Mexico and Spain, although at this point in my life I live vicariously as an eager armchair traveler. I comfortably travel to many faraway places through others' spoken and written accounts.
   
   As I read Grammar Lessons, Morano took me on a vivid tour of her daily discoveries of cultural life and relationships in Spain. The pages held me spellbound, and I wished the journey did not have to end.
   
   by Sharon Blumberg
   for Story Circle Book Reviews
   www.storycirclebookreviewsorg
   reviewing books by, for, and about women

No comments about The White Island: The Extraordinary History of the Mediterranean's Capital of Hedonism.

5 comments about Lonely Planet Portugal.

1. Egypt and Portugal are the only two countries besides America I will ever want to travel in. While not the best guide I have ever read this one is still quite useful. If you ever go there see the Palacio Nacional da Pena in Sintra and the Palaco do Visconde de Estoi near Faro



2. i've used LP Portugal on many short trips to portugal (i live in madrid, so going to portugal occurs once in a while)... after purchasing several guidebooks, i have ended up taking LP every time and leave the other guidebooks on the shelf at home... despite this, some caveats are necessary!

   the pros: the maps and city plans are substantially better than in the competitors' guidebooks.. lonely planet is one of the few economic travel guidebooks (economic travel, i mean, the book is not economical at all!) that gives you information on at least a few hotels that are not youth hostels, dives or other forms of bottom-barrel accommodation; in other words, they at least give you a few mid-range and expensive options if you wish to go that way... all the essentials are there, with great suggestions on places to sleep, eat and visit

   the cons: as with ALL of the backpacker/youth travel guidebooks (LP, footprint, rough guide, let's go), the information on sights/monuments/museums, etc., is SEVERELY lacking... there is just the most basic of information on the history of the sights that you have gone so far to see... which makes it necessary to buy another book, pay an expensive guide or some such thing... (for instance, you will rarely read detailed descriptions of the artwork to be found in a church and are often left wandering about saying 'this is so beautiful, i wonder what it is???...i wish the guidebook would tell me more!') i know this would make the guidebooks huge, but even 50% more information on what you are gawking at would be wonderful so as to have a little bit more of a grip on the backgrouns after flying so far to see it!

   which is why, despite its quality, i always feel the need to take another guidebook along, just in case...using my usual technique of tearing out just the pages i would need from each book




3. I have used the Lonely Planet guides in Asia, the Middle East, and in Europe. Lately, they seem to have lost their way. Originally, the LP guides were for people who had travelled at least a little bit before and needed some pointers to an area. The guides usually had some sort of walking tours in the cities they indicated. Their guides have become filled with useless colour photos of generic scenes, The quirky, fresh information has disappeared -- In the summer of 2004, I used the LP guides for both Portugal and Spain. I was traveling for about three months. I had been in both places before and had used a LP guide. The most recent guides are stale and minimally updated. They are also occassionally misleading; especially concerning food. Sadly, the LP guide to Portugal is not worth the weight that goes along with carrying it.



4. I enjoyed the book Lonely Planet Portugal. I will be taking it along on my upcoming trip and I am sure it will be a great help to have with me. Lot's of great information!



5. I don't expect much from Lonely Planet. Usually, they seem to be written by some sandal wearing reprobate who thinks finding vegetarian food is important. They often skip over interesting historical fact, landmarks, culture and items of artistic merit -to say nothing of local custom and folkways, in order to have enough space to tell you about where the local discos are, and where you can buy more lonely planet books (think about why this is dumb for a minute). Personally, I only buy them because they have good maps in them, and halfway decent (if bizarre) hotel and restaurant recommendations. I also buy them because nobody else really makes serious travel books (I have high hopes for the "Avant Guide" franchise). I'd probably be better off collecting antique Baedekers.
   
   This guide to Portugal was, on the other hand, quite good; well above their average offering. It's out of date in some significant ways. For example, one of the central train stations in Lisbon, Rossio, has been out of service for years; it's somewhat excusable that this is out of date information in the book, but the same thing is on their website, so I have to imagine the next edition will have the same problems. Also, when I went, there were all manner of bizarre ceremonies involving students in robes being tormented by other people; nary a mention in the book. None the less, there were many sights I had never heard of which were mentioned in the book. Many were described as "like out of star wars" by the voluble Miz Hole (or Beach), which pretty much meant: you should really see this. It wasn't a bad description, as Lucas obviously modeled some of his alien looking stuff after Manueline gothic style -just a bit matey for my tastes. There were also a number of excellent "small detail" recommendations for restaurants; a really cool fried chicken restaurant in Porto, run by a midget and a guy who looks like an undertaker -a remarkable hotel in Tomar run by the world's happiest man, Esteve. These sorts of little details made me forgive all the flaws I mentioned above. The details also made me love Portugal. Portugal isn't as dense in history and monuments as Italy, nor is the food as good as in France, but they have a very deep and wonderful culture there. This is quite a good book for getting a flavor for it, and seeing the sights which need seeing.