With a good London travel guide you'll enjoy London more
When looking for a London travel guide book there are lots of books to choose from. To help you decide which guide book to buy I looked at 7 of the most popular ones to see if any of them would really help you in London.
Before reviewing any of these travel guides I was firmly in the Internet camp. I’d always say you could get all the information you needed about London via the Internet and then print it off.
After going through most of the guide books I was still thinking that, but then I came across the winning one and it completely changed my view.
The reviews of the 7 London travel guide books are below but if you just want to know what the winner was without reading anymore, it was the Time Out London guidebook. The one you want to buy is just called “Time Out London”.
Here’s our London travel guide book review and advice
Time Out London
The Time Out guide book to London easily beat the other guides. In fact it was so good I’m seriously thinking of buying the guide, it had so many things that I didn’t know about. This guide proves that even if you live in London, there’s still lots of it you haven’t discovered.
Unlike some of the other guides, this guide isn’t heavy/weighty and would be easy to carry around all day. Also it’s not bulky so you could easily hold it or put it in to a handbag.
Some of the things that I liked were how well it was laid out, it was very easy to find the information you wanted and the print was a good size.
It easily had the best activities and entertainment section out of all the guides and if you’re coming over with kids, its kids activities section was superb. It also has very good local tips that even us locals would find useful.
You won’t go wrong with this guide.
Rough Guide to London
Before looking at the Time Out guide, the Rough Guide to London was my number one choice. It had a very clever start right at the beginning of the book with a section “20 things not to miss”, which didn’t just have the usual touristy things.
Again this guide is a good size and weight so you won’t be bothered by carrying it all day. It’s very well laid out and you can quickly and easily find information. It has a very good ‘things to do’ section and only the Time Out has a better kids activities section.
Like the Time Out it has local tips which again uncovered a few things that I didn’t know about. It’s head and shoulders above the other books so if for whatever reason you can’t get hold of the Time Out guide this is the next best one.
This guide is well written and very informative.
Frommers London 2010
At one stage the Frommers guide was looking like a contender for top honours but that’s just because the guides I read before it were so bad. Just because it’s at number 3 don’t think that makes it a book I’d recommend. I wouldn’t.
It goes into quite a bit of depth about London and this is probably what makes it the heaviest book out of all the ones I looked at. You’d know about it if you had to carry this around all day.
It’s ‘London After Dark’ section had no surprises. All the usual names appeared and it had information you could easily get from the Internet. Also its kids activities section was poor.
On the plus side, it was easy to read and well laid out and it’s way better than the next books.
A word in your ear about the following guide books
The only reason for mentioning the next books is in case you see them on special offer and are tempted to get them. If you do see them don’t be tempted, you’ll only be wasting your money.
Fodors 2009
The first things that hit me was how small the writing was. My eyesight’s fine and I had no problems with the 3 previous books so you just have to wonder who the hell did the typeface on this.
So you’ve got the small writing to contend with, but then you have the recurring problem that all of these other guides have, poor layout.
It does have some good info but because of the layout it’s hard to find. Here’s an example, they mention the Barbican family cinema, but when you go to the kids activities section, there’s no mention of it as something to do with the kids.
If you just looked at the kids section you’d never know about this cinema activity. And that’s the problem when a guide book is badly laid out, you’re the one that misses out on good events and things to do.
Moon London
This guide is the lightest of all the guides and I may be being a bit hard on it because it did have a very good festivals section and a good index at the back.
The problem I have with it is, if you know what you’re looking for you can find it from the index at the back. However when you’re using a travel guide you don’t want to have to work at it, you want it to be easy. You don’t want to have to keep going to the index to find things because the layout’s not good. I just think with other better guides about, why would you bother with this one.
Insight Guides London
If you want to see lots of photos of London then you might like this guide. But if you actually want a guide to help you in London, this fails completely. It’s more of a picture guide to London than a travel information guide.
Cadogan Guides
There’s a reason I left this one to last, I didn’t want to waste your time, like I wasted mine looking at this. The layout was so bad after only a few minutes I gave up and couldn’t be bothered to try and plough through it anymore.
Final Words about London travel guide books
As good as the Time Out and Rough Guide guides are, they can’t give you 2 fo1 deals and offers on eating out and going out in London. Plus they can’t tell you about events and activities that are actually going on during your stay.
I hope you found this useful but is there a London travel guide book that you’ve come across that has been particularly good or bad?
And if you’re thinking of visiting London over the next few months read our monthly London weather forecast.
Also if you have a car take a look at my new site CarBidOff.com or read an article I did about the importance of checking your car tyre pressures each month.
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