Customer Reviews

Lonely Planet Istanbul (City Travel Guide)

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

I have always found Lonely Planet books to be helpful. This is by far the worst I have ever purchased. The maps were helpful but so were the maps we picked up at the airport. This book is inappropriate and overly effusive.

Most Lonely Planet books are written by people far more authoritative than this. They have either lived in those places or worked there for several months at a time. It seems like this writer just took a few trips to Istanbul with her friends and somehow landed a pretty sweet book deal. She barely touches the neighborhoods that are not the main tourist attractions.

As for the touristy areas, she may as well have been a writer for the Turkish Tourism Association. She gives very little history of the places she writes about and does not give a realistic take on them. For instance, she says that Topkapi Palace is so great that "tourist attractions rarely get better than this." What she fails to mention is that very little of the palace is left in its original state so you don't get a sense of palace life. The rooms are lined with shelves with old artifacts so it is essentially a museum in a palace. The Turkish government only let the palace become a tourist attraction bit by bit so this is to be expected. It is a great place but Maxwell hardly conveys that.

Also, she says that Ayasofya will take your breath away. This is the worst-maintained historical place I have ever seen. She fails to mention that there has been scaffolding in the dome for nearly 10 years.

Also, the ferry information she gives is wrong and we missed a trip to the Princes' Islands because of it.

Lastly, I don't think phrases like "wet dream" belong in a tourism book. What does that even mean anyway?

I am not saying Istanbul is not worthy of praise. It certainly is an amazing city in its fusion of East and West and I had hoped to be guided through it by someone who better understood that rather than a bubble gum fan. I honestly cannot understand how this book made it to publishing with its lack of detail and gushing style. I usually have far better Lonely Planet experiences. Hopefully the company will update this book with a new author soon who can give Istanbul the assessment it deserves.

I am fan of Lonely Planent Encounter guides as I travel a lot in cities around the world for work. Very often I get to stay there for three months and therefore I fing Encounter guides very useful for me with all the nice shops and bars/restaurants tips given by locals.

This book is full of outdated information even though is only from last year: many of the bars/cafes/restaurants mentioned are closed. Second, many addresses are wrong. Third and most important: all the shops, bars, cafes and restaurant mentioned are really REALLY tourist traps. I do not think the author is a local at all (if she is, she hanging with tourists all the time). Also, I did not find any value added in this guide book than any other Istanbul guide book.

When I buy encounter (I have London, Tokyo, Berlin, Rome and they are top notch) I expect a different level.
A new author (please a local this time....) should completely rewrite the entrie book.

This book is a loss of money and TIME (you will loose time looking for the shop/restaurant she mentions finding out is either a tourist trap or wrong address...)

I love Istanbul, having lived there in the early 1990s. In 2005 I made my first return visit since then, and although I feel confident I know the city well, much has changed. This guide contained information which locals I stayed with weren't aware of, particularly public transport info.

My main criticism of LP books is that the maps are pretty useless, and this is once again the case. You really need to get a separate map f you are going to venture beyond the really well trodden path. (There are a couple of bookshops on Istiklal Cadessi that sell good maps).

I found the tone of the book suited me - it is enthusiastic about an amazing city, and the author certainly knows the place well. I don;t usually follow guide book suggestions for places to eat, preferring to discover those on my own. I am gald I allowed Maxwell to lead me to a couple of cafes and bars, however, as they were excellent.

I recommend this book for both the novice and experienced traveller to the city (which I don;t with all LP City Guides - some, like Paris, I think reather too basic for the experienced visitor to that city).

Worthless...incorrect info abounds. I am still on my trip in Turkey and and am in an internet cafe urgently wanting to warn others who might buy this piece of useless and misleading and just wrong crap. This book has consistently provided misleading and incorrect information and has wasted 2 of my valuable vacation days. Do I sound angry. You bet I am!!!!!! Luckily I also have a copy of the Moon Handbook to Istanbul and Turkish Coast and this has proven to be ABSOLUTELY GREAT. No more of Istanbul Encounters. The trash can is too good for it, but it is too non-absorbant to put it to it's best use.

I will take a seemingly innocuous facet of the book---ferry recommendations. The schedule times are wrong. Imagine missing a once a day Bosprous ferry cruise. I made it aboard. I wanted to see the European side so sat where the book recommended only to discover I was seated on the Asian viewing side of the vessel with no way to change to the other side since the ferry was full. Then I noticed the author had misidentified which shore several landmarks were on. I could only conclude the author had never actually taken the cruise but had relied on second-hand, wrong info. She also suggests taking the ferries to various Golden Horn locales failing to mention that the ferries run sporadically if at all, leaving me stranded and cursing. If you use this book after reading this review, heaven help you.

It also directs the tourist to a couple of really abysmally dreary and to be avoided neighborhoods. The book devotes far too much space to recommending pathetic and often out of business restaurants.

In my 40 years of travel never have I encountered such a poorly researched and presented travel guide.

I can only conclude that unless they provide specific examples, the positive reviewers liked the format of the book but did not acutally attempt to use it--a plague among travel book reviews on Amazon.

This book is already annoyingly out of date, but is still the best guide to Istanbul out right now. The prices are off and for some reason given in Euros, even though most places only want Turkish Lira. Maxwell's opinions are loud, even for a Lonely Planet guide, and I found myself disagreeing with a lot of them. Still, a good size to fit in your coat pocket while running around and discovering Istanbul.

This guide is loaded with information about Istanbul. I have found it very useful in planning my trip. i had at first bought another istanbul guide and found it to be really lacking in substance. Mostly pictures, not much text, lots of platitudes designed to dazzle you, and made of heavy paper that is a drag to carry around. the lonely planet guide is lightweight, informative, good maps, and enough pictures to satisfy.

Very few images, all of the typical touristy things. Map has only the main streets named, and only a small segment of Istanbul at that. Save your money and get the D&K guide instead.

I really liked reading the ideas that the locals have for some offbeat sightseeing, also liked the basic instructions for the hamams (which I'd love to do, but need instructions like this in order to feel comfortable enough to try.) I also liked the locals ideas regarding the best place to try for lokum, art, dining, etc.

Istanbul (City Guide)

This book is more a map, a formal guide what you can find in Istanbul.When your goal is to see as much as possible at the city, this guide is for you.
But if you want to get information about Topkapi palace harem and its habitants, its better to look for more informal guide with stories.
Descriptions of objects are very short, mostly connected to architecture facts and dates. No soul of this big, various and interesting city. Only information.

This review is about the Kindle edition.

I use my Kindle a lot and am thrilled LP has a bunch of books available, both country guides (like LP Turkey, Russia...) and city guides (like LP Istanbul, Moscow...)

However, I must say that LP is doing a half-assed job with the city guides. Why? Because they're not proper city guides.

One would expect a city guide to have more detail about the city than a country guide. However, LP's Kindle city guides are just the chapter of the city that's covered in the country guide. so it's not the kind of in-depth info one finds in LP's own paper city guide. It's adequate information, but a let-down compared to what LP sells in print.

ON top of that, LP lazily copied all the introduction stuff from the country guide into the so-called city guide. Lots of information I don;t need, plus several pages with itineraries for the whole country, covering sights and destinations that are not even covered in the city guide. And an index that doesn't work (not hyper-linked).

This is what I mean- half-assed. LP has the content available- why don't they transfer it to Kindle format? Instead, they're doing this lazy copy-paste job that leaves much to be desired.

I have the LP Istanbul print edition and wanted to replace it by the Kindle edition- but that has so much less information that i returned it and used my paper version instead. Frustrating and unnecessary.

Thanks for listening!