Customer Reviews

The World's Cheapest Destinations: 21 Countries Where Your Dollars Are Worth a Fortune

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

 

 

This small 113 page guide book discusses general aspects of several low price, low risk (they're not "on the US State Department's 'Warning List' due to a dangerous climate for travelers") destinations. A lot of the prices depend on your bargaining skills. The short chapters cover briefly topics such as accommodation, food & drink (including some vegetarian references), and transportation. As well as some other general tips. The countries include: in Asia: Thailand, Indonesia, Malaysia, Laos, Vietnam, India, & Nepal; in Africa & the Middle East: Morocco, Egypt, & Jordan; in Europe: Turkey, Bulgaria, Hungary, & the Czech Republic; in the Americas: Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras, Bolivia, Peru, Ecuador, & Venezuela. The appendices do include a listing of other travel resources, including a couple of websites. If you want a general overview of possible cheap destinations (don't expect a lot of information on sites that you can see) then you might want to give this book a look, but don't expect anything too in depth. This book might best be used to find a country that you may want to visit, you can then buy a more detailed guide book about the country. Although this book will give you a general budget for visiting the country of your choice. In the future you might also want to take into account that the book is from 2003, although because it is so general and the prices depend on bargaining this shouldn't matter too much.

The author summarizes this book succinctly himself on page 9, "This book is meant to be a primer, an overview, and a jumping-off point. It can't possibly take the place of a thick, general travel advice guide, or a guidebook for a specific destination or region."

The book covers twenty-one countries across Asia, Africa & the Middle East, Europe, and North and South America. Each country is given three to five pages consisting of a summary followed by accommodation, food and drink, transportation, and "What Else?" sections. If you're a penny pinching backpacker this is definitely the book for you. The author gives sample prices of everything. When it comes to rooms he tells how much the cheapest room you can get is as well as how much more you'll have to fork over to get a decent enough room to stay in for the night.

For anyone, however, this is only an idea generator with a few good tips throw in for good measure. You will certainly need an in-depth, up-to-date travel guide for any of these locations, and as I mentioned above the author admits that himself.

This book is great! Finding ways to travel to fascinating and exotic places without spending a fortune is a real plus for people like me, a teacher. I can't wait to gather some friends and make plans. This book will pay for itself many times over. It's full of practical advice about accomodations, dining, best ways to travel within countries, and things to see or avoid. I espececially like the list of things you can get for "a buck or less" in each country.

Great advice and crisply written. A novice or an experienced traveler should welcome the recommendations Tim Leffel offers. Vacation time is limited and the author forewarns you how to avoid tourist traps and how to spend your monies wisely. A must read ---- especially for those on a limited budget!

I enjoyed this book because it gives 3-5 page summary/opinion on each country. It would require a lot of guide books and research to find what he has laid out so succinctly.

I am an avid traveller who is always seeking out interesting and affordable new places to visit. So I found this book to be highly informative.

Leffel includes 7 destinations each from Asia and Latin America, the 2 regions of greatest interest to me. He also includes 4 European countries and 3 from Africa and the Middle East. Some might complain that sub-Saharan Africa is left out. But overall Leffel has done a terrific job of picking out places where travel is relatively cheap and there is much to see and do.

Obviously, there is still a huge expense gap between super cheap India and the not so cheap Czech Republic, for instance. But Leffel does his best to provide a cost summary of each country for both mid-range and rock bottom budget travellers. Also I found his appendices section to provide some other helpful print and internet resources for travel.

It's important to keep in mind that this book only provides an introduction to each country listed and that a good guidebook by Lonely Planet, Moon or one of the other backpacker style guidebooks is still a necessity before actually setting off on your travels. But this book is great for helping a potential traveller figure out what country or countries to visit.

My only minor complaint is that I wish Leffel had made a list of the countries from cheapest to most expensive with an average daily budget for each one. Of course, this list would fluctuate over time depending on currency valuations and other economic factors. But still it would be fun and interesting to have as a basic guideline. Maybe next time Leffel can do have the "World's 50 Cheapest Destinations" as there are so many other great countries that can visited on the cheap. In any case, I consider this book highly recommended for adventurous budget travellers.

I go everywhere cheaply and this one was a great book for that. I found so many bargains.

I liked this book and feel that I will benefit from it, but it doesn't seem to be the whole story. There would seem to be many other places in the world where your dollars stretch. But for a beginning look at the areas in the world where you can get more bang for your buck, this is a good book. I recommend it, but I am also going to keep looking for others, just to get a more balanced point of view and other recommendations.

I bought this book on the recommendation of a friend and now, would like to recommend it to others. I love to travel but, don't have a lot to spend so, this book was exactly what I was looking for! The author is witty and interesting so, it was easy, enjoyable reading. Now, the only thing to decide is where to go first!

I had plans on following this book's advice and they listed so many wonderful places to go but now I don't have the book as my sister threw it out after I had to abandon my home due to a domestic violence situation. I would recommend this book to anyone and will buy another one when my finances and situation is back in order to travel again.