Eyewitness Travel Guides (by DK Travel) launched a service to create your own guidebook online. You choose the material you want, then download it for $5.00.

DK Travel - Create your own Guidebook - free trial until March 26

Start by REGISTERING. Once you verify your email, navigate to destinations and click "add to guide" for the articles to add. Add articles, driving guides, restaurant listings, shop listings.

After you have added things, click OPEN in the upper right and you can organize your guide.

They also some driving guides and podcasts of walking tours. You can add up to 50 items.

I am creating a custom guidebook for Tuscany (they don't have Umbria yet).

Wow, Pauline. Thanks for this thread. I'm glad I saw it before the deadline.
I'm going to go see if they have the areas of Spain and Portugal we plan to visit.

I am downloading my Tuscany Guidebook. You can even upload your own photo for the cover. Just click the DOWNLOAD button and it is downloaded for free during the trial period.

Maybe I'm doing something wrong, but I didn't find that there's much information here. I also tried to do a Tuscany guide, for Southern Tuscany, and nothing that I clicked on had more than a sentance or two of information. Hardly worth the effort.

I think I'll stick with paper guidebooks for now!

Things are quiet at work, so I've just had a play with Madrid. Not heaps of info, but useful for general planning. The maps that are included look quite good. Will need to play with it some more. Looks like only Madrid & Barcelona are available for Spain - a bit limiting for most STers!!

This is so cool. Maybe we should start collecting old guide books.

Hi

It seems to be a bit limited at the moment but it is a good idea and I think this is a concept that will continue to grow. I think as more and more people are getting connected it will be more and more popular to share info on the net via forums, rating databases etc. So maybe the guidebook will disappear eventually.

I love the idea, but the info available is SO superficial, and there are no maps! I would really like to see the same concept applied to Slowtrav info. Pauline, Steve and I discussed doing that once.

Yeah, to what Chris said. ...although Chris B mentions maps, I didn't find any. In theory its a nice idea but the content is lacking here. When I heard it was DK I had high hopes that they'd include their fabulous 3D maps but those aren't there, for sure.

To answer the original question, I really don't think this would ever replace a paper guidebook for the majority--its just too much work. Most people (other than us travel obsessed web geeks ) want simplicity--pick up a book at a bookstore or order it from Amazon, and your done!

I love the idea of a SlowTrav version though! In fact many of us already do that, to a point--printing out what we need and putting it in a binder. It would be great to have a "filing system" online, like in this DK product, where we could copy pages as we find them, rearrange them, and then have a nice printable version. This is probably too much to ask for

I thought guidebooks started to die two years ago or maybe it was me?

Last year I bought three guidebooks for my upcoming trip to Buenos Aires. The guide books were only helpful to get an idea what to do and were to eat. In the end the B&B I stayed at for two weeks in Buenos Aires was not in any of the guidebooks but was recommended from a travel forum. All the places I had lunch/dinner were recommend from the travel Buenos Aires forums or by the Portenos (Slang for people that live in Buenos Aires). The estancia I visited for horseback riding was also recommended from the BA travel forum and I never read about it in any of the guidebooks.

While I was in Buenos Aires, I posted a message on a BA travel forum asking about a leather store I was thinking of buying a leather jacket from. Within a few hours I received a few replies about it and next day I bought my leather jacket from the store.

I find the only thing I need now is a map, a very good street map and I hardly use a guidebook. The really important travel information is no longer in the guidebooks, it the travel forums. I do not know the authors of the guidebooks, but I do know the names I see consistently giving good travel advice on BA and that is who I listen to. Go to the Italy/France SlowTalk forums; we have people giving out advice that are far better than any guidebook.

I plan for 2008 are to return to Spain. I will not read any guidebooks on Spain because I know what forums to visit for advice.

I can understand guidebooks for are those people that need to plan and have the security of knowing what to do and eat, every day, every hour before they go on their once in a lifetime trip.

I guess I more of a free spirit when I travel, I plan for the day and let fate fill in the hours.

Bill

For the past ten years all of my travel has primarily been arranged through the internet, including finding and booking accomodations. I read books to get a sense of history, interest, culture and I LOVE maps and still buy them in the bookstore.

The only thing I do wish and maybe a system like the one that started the chain will do this, is make it so I can print out 1/2 pages or note card size information because I don't like bringing folded 8.5 x 11 pieces of paper! I like the idea of printing stuff out AND having a small notebook to put stuff in.

I have been seriously addicted to travel books - we have 2-3 travel books on places we've never been and likely won't go just because we "thought" maybe we would. Now we can do so much research online - you don't have to buy a travel book but they're still fun to look at. I am looking more and more, however, for nice little travel books that DON'T have accomodations in them because I don't need that but they are hard to find.

I am taking my Chow Venice book with me - just because - even though I have highlighted the places I'd like to try, I' m still taking it because its nice and small. I also like those pocket size guides for the fold out maps and the addresses and opening and closing times of museums, etc. But gone forever are the days of taking Lonely Planet or Moon Publications actually WITH me on a trip - there's just no room anymore in my carryon!

Pauline, how do they print out? Are they on regular letter-sized paper?

One option I like for easy travel access is the e-books for my Palm. The Rough Guides are only $5.00 each. They're good for quickly looking up info like addresses and hours of museums, etc.

Still, I agree with the comments that the introductory guidebook isn't that useful for most of the traveling we're doing now.

I think the day is not far off when we will be able to get most of our travel information on the spot via the web on cell phones. We actually did some of this on our recent trip to Italy with a TIM card in our Treo, but a lot of web sites still won't display properly on the mobile screen.

- Roz

I used the DK site this morning to put together a Naples guide, and I also found the information superficial. What was most annoying was that 60% or more of the items that I selected to add to the guide didn't make it.

I may take the maps with me (these are added automatically when you download the completed guide) but I don't think I'll bother with the rest.

Although I do a lot of my research on the internet I'm not ready to give up my guidebooks.

Darn you, Pauline. I'm supposed to be running errands and cleaning house. Instead I've just spent more than an hour pulling out bits and pieces for two guide books (Rome & Tuscany).

Now who's going to clean my house?

(Obviously kidding... unless someone volunteers to clean for me. )

I would love to see your Tuscany guide, Pauline!! I'm attempting to put one together for myself. I'm on dial-up, which makes it a real slog. Also, several times when I have tried to "add to my guidebook", I've gotten an "error on the page" indicator--and sometimes doing a simple refresh doesn't fix it.

Perhaps as we make our books we could put the URLs on this thread for others to see them....

Neat idea--definitely in the growing pains stage, though.

In the early boom days of the web when a million ventures launched and failed there was a site called booktailor.com. I used it for our first backpacking trip in 2001. It allowed you to select sections from a variety of guidebooks on the place and topic (food, lodging, attractions etc) and organize into chapters, and customize with your name, date and details of your trip. it was so cool! I made the book for our 5 country 25 day trip but sadly have lost the book since. They flopped not long after and I've wished something would replace them.

The DK Guides are somewhat superficial even in the print version - especially for rural areas. When you add parts to the guide for shops or hotels or restaurants, they are very short. But the city descriptions are better.

I went into my account and set my Tuscany Guidebook to be shared. I will post when I have the link. I made it really quickly - just picking city pages in Tuscany with a few restaurants - so it isn't that great.

It is a 5mb Adobe file when I download it. It prints from Adobe Acrobat on a letter sized page; the print is a bit small. The page does not fill the paper - 1.5" from top and bottom and from each side.

Here is my cover:

Thank you, Pauline.
I just looked at this thread and I can see where the rest of my Saturday will be spent.

I love your cover!

I am the last person to appreciate this particular question.

1. I am writing a guidebook, to be published (d.v.) as a book, with paper and covers.

2. I am the guy who thinks that taking 20 guidebooks along is normal, no, necessary.

3. I love books.

When we were touring Tuscany, often we would end up by some little town or church, and I would root through the guidebooks until I found out the altarpiece we shouldn't miss or a great restaurant. Now what if I hadn't had the foresight to download that information? Not until all the information in all the guidebooks is all collected and all downloadable for free will the printed guidebook pass on.

It's sort of like this: I love Nigella Lawson. So I go to her website and download the recipes I can find, print them out, maybe even bind them, so I can keep them in one place. Oh. Right. That's been done. It's called a cookbook.

Yrs, Robert

My name is KT and I am a guidebook and travel lit addict. I have bookshelves full of them, including ones about places where I've never gone and places where I know I never will go. My friends and I refer to them as my pornography--I take them to bed and fantasize, I (figuratively) drool over them, I can't get enough of them, I can't stop myself from getting more. Downloading practical info for someplace I know I'm going can never, ever scratch that itch. If guidebooks disappear, I'll have to turn to some other, more harmful addiction, like watching TV. Please don't let that happen.

I'm a guidebook addict too.I go to the friends of the library sale and buy as many as I can carry out in a bag. I keep all my guidebooks as trip mementos (it's fun to see later what I highlighted and underliend). I have literally shelves full. This is just one more fun toy!

Pauline,

Your question reminds me of the difference between making a beeline to the library card catalogue with a question in mind and browsing the stacks. I'm a browser.

If there's a possiblility of digital serendipity, then maybe the demise of guidebooks wouldn't be as mournful as I imagine. But if the online drill is to ask for what one wants, or thinks one wants, and receive it, that to me would be blinkered. What if 40 kilometers down the road, or 4 times 40 kilometers down the road, there's something wonderful I miss while downloading the information about my "quadrants" of interest?

The Web is a great tool, but I do love books. Six guidebooks and one Web site is the ideal mix for me when planning a trip.

And the one Web site is ....

Dave

I probably have over 10 feet of guidebooks - I love guidebooks. But I found it pretty interesting to use their tool for creating one.

I tried to make the guide I made public, but they did not email me the link.

I never take my guidebooks with me. I xerox the pages I need and take them. Then I toss them when I am done with them and don't worry about carrying around heavy books. I keep the books for reference.