The many uses of a guidebook

I agree 100% with Vicky Baker's 'In defense of guidebooks' posted 18th June on Going Local Travel.

Guidebooks have a valuable place in the traveller's tool kit. They give you that cushion of reassurance that you have come prepared. It's a perfect back up for the independent traveller. I personally use them to get some background information on a place and to find interesting tit bits to share with my fellow travellers along the way. No where else do you have a hand-held condensed copy of useful and often very interesting information on a place. You never know when you might have a burning question about the date of a particular building and more often than not guidebooks hold the answer.

Buying the guidebook is also part of the anticipation. You buy it. You carry it around for weeks before departure just to remind yourself that you're going away somewhere and then 5 minutes before you land, you start to read it.

One of the greatest benefits of guidebooks, it has to be said, is your chance to display your great adventures on your bookshelves. I use my collection of Rough Guides to (perhaps not so subtly) say, 'just look how well travelled I am'.