Lonely Planet France (Country Guide)

My mom and I recently took a two week trip to France. While researching for our trip, my mom primarily consulted a Rick Steves France travel guide, and I downloaded the Lonely Planet France guide for my Kindle. We were both rather disappointed by the Rick Steves guide but found the Lonely Planet book very helpful!Prior to the trip, I found the guide very useful in making preliminary plans and decisions, and I liked how the guide was organized. The book's introductory material includes useful starting point information, like suggested itineraries, general information about the country, and a list of top 15 experiences. There is also a "Regions at a Glance" section. Taken together, the front end material was very helpful in narrowing down the plethora places to visit. Following the introductory material, the guide expands on each region in detail, with individual cities broken down into recommended sights, accommodations, food, activities, shopping, etc. The end of the book provides brief overviews on various topics on French history and culture, as well as basic travel tips.During our trip, my mom and I used the guide on my Kindle primarily for restaurant recommendations. The first Lonely Planet recommendation we tried was an ice cream counter in Nice called Fennocchio. The ice cream was fantastic, and there were so many intriguing flavors to try that we just had to come back for a sweet snack again the next day! After our success at Fennocchio, we tried a hole-in-the-wall sandwich counter in Arles called Fad'Ola. We enjoyed the sandwiches there so much that we delayed our departure from Arles by a few hours just so we could eat lunch there again the following day! Other fantastic restaurant recommendations from the guide included a delicious dinner at Le Gaboulet in Arles as well as dinner at Fou de Fafa in Avignon, which was our favorite meal of the trip.Besides food, we made some other great travel decisions based on information in this book. In Paris, we had a pleasant stay at the Hotel France Albion, which was recommended by the guide. The book also brought to our attention the Gorges du Verdon (the 'Grand Canyon of Europe'), and the tour we ended up booking there was one of the highlights of our trip.Since we had so much success with the Lonely Planet France guidebook, I purchased Lonely Planet Austria to plan my next trip. I hope the recommendations in that guidebook impress me just as much as my mom and I were impressed by our experiences in France!

Another thorough book!

EXCELLENT

It brings good ideas. :)

My son is going to work in France and this is a great book for him to use and explore his new country.