Rick Steves’ Germany 2011 With Map

Find Similar Products Like Rick Steves Germany 2011 With Map @ Amazon.com

Rick Steves Germany 2011 With Map

Designed quintessentially for Rick’s travel audience (or users) these maps spotlight choice destinations allround Germany, Austria, and Switzerland, from the shore of the North Sea to the towering Alps, in a colorful, easy-to-use format on high-quality paper that lasts over a great deal of trips:

• Cuts the Clutter: While big cities are left for navigational purposes, this map is other than as supposed or expected stripped clean and filled in only with places that matter to travelers.
• Guidebook-Friendly: At a glance, all the places you read regarding in Rick’s Germany, Austria, and Switzerland guidebook pop right out in a crisp, easy-to-read format.
• Rail or Road: Includes essential train lines and highways (and ferry routes) for easy route-planning, no matter how you’ll get around.
• The Back’s Even Better: The reverse side includes elaborated city-center maps of Berlin, Munich and Vienna, locating sights, hotels and restaurants from Rick’s city chapters.

Amazon Sales Rank: #87621 in Books
Published on: 2007-01-24
Format: Folded Map
Original language: English
Number of items: 1
Dimensions: .1 pounds
Binding: Map

ReviewToday’s tourists are as likely to be toting Rick Steves as Giorgio Armani, tasting the good life without burning through the Kids’ college fund.

29 of 30 people found the following review helpful.
What’s good is very good. What’s bad…oy.
By Esther Schindler
I’m both attracted and annoyed by Rick Steves’ travel guides. I’m giving this book a 3, not because it’s generally okay, but because it’s an average of 1 and 5.

Steves does some things really well. His maps are really good, for instance. Rather than try to show every street (you’ll have an ordinary map for that), he makes it easy to find the places you probably care about (or the ones he thinks you should care about); the museums, train station, etc. are easy to find — like the map you’d scribble on a cocktail napkin for a friend. Plus, he’s reassuring about distances from one place to another (a ten-minute walk to the museum from the train station, etc.).

He also does a good-to-excellent job at, hmm, how shall I put this — describing the experience of a place. I haven’t been to Munich, yet, and his is the only guide that tells me that the biergarten tables with no tablecloths are reserved for customers who are drinking only (no food, in other words). And to look for a vomitorium in the bathrooms (!). When I’m traveling, I’m tripped up by the “ordinary” things I didn’t know — so this sort of information is reassuring. (Why do none of the guide books tell you that “Ausfart” is the word for “car exit” on the autobahn? As a friend of ours said, “The first time I saw all those Ausfart signs, I thought, ‘Wow, this is a really big city!’” Ausgang, by the way, is the word for *people*-exit, a helpful item to know when you’re in an underground parking garage, looking for the way out.)

Also, Steves is better at orientation than most. I think his is the only book that says you can get tickets ahead of time for the big Bavarian castles, so you don’t spend time waiting in line. That sort of stuff is incredibly useful.

On the other hand… his priorities and taste do not coincide with mine. As another reviewer pointed out, Steves gives you the itinerary *he* thinks you should follow, and ignores or disparages other destinations. Maybe he thinks that Triberg is a tourist trap, but I spent 3 days in the area (in Hornberg, a few miles north) and I thought it was both a lovely town and a great base of operations for Black Forest exploration.

What finally turned me off was realizing how differently he travels than we do. (There. That doesn’t seem so negative.) Steves gives a one-day itinerary through the Black Forest, starting in Frieburg and ending in Baden-Baden. To accomplish that, he has you zoom through the Clock Musuem in an hour (we spent two, though maybe it could have been less), and 1.5 hours at the Volksbaurnhof in Gutach. That’s way too little time; we spent 3 or 4 hours there on two trips (obviously, we liked the place). Yes, in an hour and a half you can walk around this open-air museum, but you won’t have time to watch one of the demonstrations, or read more than a few expanatory signs. If I followed his itinerary, I’d be skimming the surface of every destination rather than experiencing the place.

I own several guidebooks to Germany. It’s probably worth looking through this one, especially if you happen to be planning to visit the sights he says are worthwhile. But it’s far from a complete guide to the country, and you’re stuck relying on HIS opinions — which may or may not agree with yours. I’m glad I read through this book, but it’s sure not being stuffed into my backpack.

46 of 55 people found the following review helpful.
You’re going to LOVE GERMANY!
By Richard R. Carlton
I’ve been to Germany several times…..Frankfurt, Koln, the Mosel and Rhine wine tours, etc. Here are my reviews of the best guides to meet your exact needs…..I hope these are helpful and that you have a great visit! I always gauge the quality of my visit by how much I remember a year later……this review is designed to help you get the guide that will be sure YOU remember your trip many years into the future. Travel Safe and enjoy yourself to the max!

17 of 19 people found the following review helpful.
Great Guide
By laura joy
My husband and I used this book to plan our honeymoon and found it to be phenomenal. Steves does a great job of rating what you should see with the time you have. So it was great for planning our scant two weeks. He very candidly describes different places and explains what he likes about them or why he rates them low. This is helpful in deciding what you absolutly have to do since time is limited. Steves also has wonderful tips for drivers, where parking is located for example, and for accomodations. We loved all of our hotels and they were all well located and reasonably priced.

This tour guide has two drawbacks. One are the crude maps. They are fine for getting a general lay out, but buying detailed maps is a must, especially for drivers. It also has no pictures. Since I’m a visual person I also bought the DK Guide to Germany. It lists EVERYTHING and has a picture of EVERYTHING. So, once I used Steves to decide what to do and where to stay I would find out what it looked like elswhere.

We are planning a trip to England for next year, I’m certainly not going without his guide.

See all 18 customer reviews…