Customer Reviews

Lonely Planet Pacific Northwest (Lonely Planet Washington, Oregon, & the Pacific Northwest)

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Full of ideas and covers all the good stuff.

This is not a city resturant guide, however. Someone else gave this book 3 stars because it only told them about the highlights of what makes the Pacific Northwest special, and didn't name the 5-star resturants. I am a 4th-generation Seattle-ite and fancy resturants are not my scene. Go anywhere, eat wild salmon and a latte, then go do some more walks or boat trips or something like that!

I have lots of guidebooks - and lots of Lonely Planets, for that matter. But despite the fact that they say they are for "independent travellers", I keep finding ridiculous reviews on restaurants and hotels, to the point where I've stopped using them.

The History, Snapshot, and similar sections are great, but if you have a brain of your own - use it. Forget their restaurant and hotel recommendations, as I'm not even sure they visit the places. Sometimes they have history or comments on places that is worthwhile to read, though. All tourbooks may have these drawbacks, to be fair.

Finally, I think I'm going to stop buying Lonely Planet's, though. First, they always act like driving is so scary everywhere, when it's actually quite easy to anyone with a brain. They also forget to give worthwhile tips on getting a car, etc. I imagine that this is their way of "saving the Earth". To a person who does care about the Earth, but doesn't believe that being a dirty hippie is going to save anything, this - and all their other BS trying to coerce their opinions onto you as fact - gets really freakin' old. Yes, yes, I know, LP is founded by some hippie freak from AUS or something - whooptie doo. That doesn't mean I have to pay some jerk who's going to push his politics on me, whether I agree with them or not.

I literally just got back from my trip which spanned from Berekely, CA- Vancouver, BC and we used this book throughout the whole trip. The hotel and restaurant recommendations are excellent and for every price range. We did a lot of last minute changes of plans and the book was able to help us with those hotel reservations. It also contains great maps and excellent background history of the area. If you are traveling through the Pacific Northwest I highly recommend this book.

While this book provides fairly accurate guidance regarding natural features and campgrounds, don't use it a reliable guide to travel necessities that are market driven like hotels, restaurants, admission costs, etc. Each time we used the book to choose a hotel, we were surprised and sadly disappointed in either the quality, the cost, or both. The same for recommended restaurants. Admission costs were generally 20% higher than listed. No big deal, but again, for a current publication it fell short in accuracy. It's as if an earlier printing was simply published as current without checking on the accuracy of the contents.

Use it as a guide, but not as a reference. I'm sure there are other sources of more accurate information for travelers.