The Rough Guide to Tunisia 7 (Rough Guide Travel Guides) [Paperback]

Peter Morris (Author), Daniel Jacobs (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 21, 2005 | Series: Rough Guide Travel Guides

The Rough Guide to Tunisia is the definitive guide to this fascinating North African country. The guide includes a full-colour 24-page introduction to Tunisia''s highlights, from the mile-long beaches of the mediterranean coast to the fortified Kasbahs of the mountainous interior and the Saharan oases towns. The guide gives lively accounts of all the sights, from Roman remains and Islamic monuments to the ancient Medinas of Tunis, Sfax and Sousse. There is comprehensive coverage of the resorts - Hammamet, Sousse and Port el Kantaoui with details of their beaches and the best excursions to the surrounding mountains and deserts. For each city, town and village there are in-depth reviews of the best places to stay, eat, shop and haggle. The authors also provide authoritative background on the country''s history, religious and social traditions, wildlife, architecture and its use as a location for films such as ''The Life of Brian'' and ''Star Wars''.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Daniel Jacobs has contributed to several Rough Guides, including West Africa, Morocco, Egypt and India. Peter Morris wrote the original edition of this book in 1985 and once played a game of football with Glen Hoddle.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

Climate and seasons

Tunisia follows usual Mediterranean patterns of climate. The best time to travel, from a scenic point of view, is spring, when the south has not yet reached full heat and the north looks astonishingly fertile - above all, around the orchards and vineyards of Cap Bon. Be warned, though, that March and April are the dampest months of the year in the south and it can bucket down in the north.

Summer has mixed virtues. July and August are much the hottest months of the year - if only slightly more so than in the southern parts of Italy or Greece - and the one time you really do need to lapse into a local way of life, for example resting through the midday hours at a cafŽ or taking a siesta at your hotel. Obviously this goes above all for the deep south and the ksour (see Chapter Nine). On the more exposed beaches of the north coast, midsummer is actually a pull - some of them are only warm enough for swimming from around May until October. If you wait until autumn, you get the best of both worlds, with warm swimming and few crowds, even at the big resorts.

In winter, the north and the Tell can get distinctly cold; A•n Draham, the highest mountain town, commonly has a metre of snow, and in 1985 it even snowed at Bizerte on the Mediterranean coast. Tunis, Cap Bon and Sousse are not so much cold in winter as dull, with sporadic rains. But this is an ideal time for covering the ancient sites at leisure and then migrating south to Jerba's beaches and the Sahara. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Product Details

• Paperback: 608 pages
• Publisher: Rough Guides; 7 edition (March 21, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1843533960
• ISBN-13: 978-1843533962
• Product Dimensions: 7.7 x 5.1 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.5 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,978,599 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #57 in Books > History > Africa > Tunisia

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

29 of 29 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Must-Have Book for Travellers to Tunisia, September 29, 2000

By 

Clark Matthews (Hoboken, NJ USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Tunisia: The Rough Guide, Fifth Edition (Tunisia (Rough Guides), 5th ed) (Paperback)

If you're bound for Tunisia, you won't want to leave without this book. I'm one of those people who thinks there is never any *one* guide that's ideal for a destination -- I always take 2 good guides. And, for Tunisia, the Rough Guide is definitely the first of the two.

It is much, much more comprehensive than any other guide. The Blue Guide (my other choice for Tunisian visits), Lonely Planet Guide (also excellent though with less background), and others literally do not have 1/2 the content of the Rough Guide.

By supplementing this book with one other one (the Blue Guide for in-depth history & cultural information, or the Lonely Planet Guide for a smaller, hipper subset of travel tips) you'll have a great Tunisian stay. Whichever "other" guide you choose, you'll want this one for the COMPLETE story of any destination in any corner of Tunisia.

Whether you're basking on the corniche at Hammamet, Bizerte, or la Marsa; travelling to tourist meccas like the Tunis Medina, Carthage, Sfax, Jerba, el Djem, Matmata and the Sahara palmeries; or taking jaunts to more out-of-the-way spots like Kerkouane or Tabarka... Take this book.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Most useful and highly recommended, January 11, 2007

By 

Annika Eriksson "Annika" (Sweden, Europe) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Rough Guide to Tunisia 7 (Rough Guide Travel Guides) (Paperback)

I'm a editor in Sweden and purchased this guide (together with Lonely Planet Tunisia) after my visit to Tunisia. Both are most useful in my work now and I highly recommended them. For those who are planning to visit Tunisia - prepare by reading the Rough Guide, and use the LP Tunisia as a guidebook during your visit.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Much better than the current Lonely Planet., May 28, 2009

By 

Skylar Suorez (California USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Rough Guide to Tunisia 8 (Rough Guide Travel Guides) (Paperback)

The current Rough Guide (8th ed., March 2009) is better in every way than the current edition of Lonely Planet Tunisia (4th ed., April 2007), covering more and in greater detail. A glance at the accommodations section for Tunis shows 32 hotels and hostels reviewed by Rough Guide, compared to the 14 in Lonely Planet. The best hotel we found in Jerba, Hotel Arischa, comes recommended by Rough Guide, and is not even listed in Lonely Planet. Prices have increased significantly since LP was researched, and you will find generally more accurate information in RG.

That's not to say the current LP isn't useful, and I'm still a big fan of their books. With so little travel information available in English, I'd recommend just getting both books and cross-referencing. But this should without a doubt be your primary resource.