Every time I read a travel guide to Maryland, it makes me want to visit. But I live here, so that's totally out of the question -- at least until gas hits $4, at which time I will limit my travel to a 10-mile radius from my house. I may even explore Towson.

But for now I'll just be reading the new guide to Maryland & Delaware by Moon Handbooks ($19.95 list price; $13.57 at amazon.com). The book was released in April along with a guide to the Chesapeake Bay. ($14.21 at amazon.com)

Moon is one of my favorite travel guides, and I'm sure these two books are no exception. Especially for travelers who may be considering staying closer to home this summer, the books offer great ideas for daytrips and weekend getaways. They'll soon have you mooning over Maryland.

Posted by Michelle Deal-Zimmerman at 12:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
                    

The second edition of 10 Best of Everything: An Ultimate Guide for Travelers, published by National Geographic, has a tidbit to whet the appetite.

It names Dogfish Head Craft Brewed Ales in Rehoboth Beach as one of the best brews on the planet. Most of the other beers on the list are from Belgium or Denmark or (somehow) San Diego. 

I've never been to Rehoboth or sampled the Dogfish vintage, so I can't agree or disagree. But I now have a legitimate "work-related" reason to head to the beach. Or a package store.

There's nothing like a cold beer on a hot day. What's your favorite beach brew? 

(Photo: Karl Merton Ferron, Sun Photographer) 

Posted by Michelle Deal-Zimmerman at 4:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
                    

When was the last time you bought a Lonely Planet or Let's Go travel guide? I checked some out of the library for my recent trip to Puerto Rico. But aren't you more and more leaving those heavy books at home?

The Atlantic Monthly's correspondent Wayne Curtis recently wrote about visiting Seattle using only Internet travel sites to guide him. A GPS unit and advice from sites such as TripAdvisor, Yelp, Chowhound and Wikitravel was all he had to depend on. How did he fare? Well he didn't find his poorly-ranked cheap hotel to be quite as deplorable as the TripAdvisor reviews described it. And Google Earth help Curtis easily locate coffee shops within walking distance from his hotel. Searching a plethora of social-networking travel sites (Ning.com, VirtualTourist.com, IgoUgo.com), Curtis does complain: "The biggest downside of Travel 2.0 is the surfeit of information—how do you sort through all this detail and random advice?" His most useful site? The foodie's playground: Chowhound.com

Do you agree with Curtis that traditional travel guides, with their tedious indexes, now feel like "15-century technology"? Or can't you leave home without them? Click here for Curtis's favorite travel sites.

(Photo: Pikes Place Market in Seattle. Associated Press.) 

Posted by Laura McCandlish at 1:46 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
                    

The life of a travel writer is presumed to be glamorous, flighty and a bit devil-may-care.

Now a Lonely Planet guidebook author has proven it - minus the glamour part. In his just-released book, Do Travel Writers Go To Hell?, Thomas Kohnstamm admits to some ethically challenging behavior while writing travel guides for cultural favorite Lonely Planet. Like writing about Colombia while he was in California and possibly borrowing some of the information in his guides. Some news reports have the writer exchanging favors for positive reviews. Kohnstamm denies a lot of the charges, but geez,  you just can’t believe anything you read any more. (This blog, of course, is excluded from that overstatement.)

His book has caused quite the fracas over at Lonely Planet. And it ought to, since he makes travel writers look like morons. I'm a travel EDITOR, so I'm not personally offended. Well, not totally. Kinda. A little.

Some people really depend on their guides to get them through a trip. I’ve never been a very by-the-book traveler because I think it’s fun to discover places on your own, for better or worse. But like most people, I do some research before I go, and that includes reading travel guides. Frommer’s and Fodor’s are the big ones. I also like Eyewitness Travel and, until this very moment, Lonely Planet. Well, I still like LP. Of course, tripadvisor.com is one of the best, but you can’t pack it in your carry-on.

What are your favorite travel guides – and do you follow their recommendations faithfully?

Posted by Michelle Deal-Zimmerman at 11:38 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)