Lonely Planet Colombia
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Product Description
Product Description
Lonely Planet knows Colombia. Whether you want to strill the cobbled streets of colonial Cartagena, bask on a dazzling Caribbean beach, sample some of the world's finest java on a coffee plantation or show off your salsa moves at a packed Cali nightclub, our 5th edition takes you there.
Lonely Planet guides are written by experts who get to the heart of every destination they visit. This fully updated edition is packed with accurate, practical and honest advice, designed to give you the information you need to make the most of your trip.
In This Guide:
Dedicated Outdoors chapter with trekking, diving and paragliding
Sizzling nightlife and dining picks for Bogota, Medellin and Cali
Revealed: La Guajira, the Pacific Coast and other emerging hotspots
Lonely Planet guides are written by experts who get to the heart of every destination they visit. This fully updated edition is packed with accurate, practical and honest advice, designed to give you the information you need to make the most of your trip.
In This Guide:
Dedicated Outdoors chapter with trekking, diving and paragliding
Sizzling nightlife and dining picks for Bogota, Medellin and Cali
Revealed: La Guajira, the Pacific Coast and other emerging hotspots
Inside This Book
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
31 of 32 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Having just come back from a three week vacation to Colombia using this guide, I'm really disappointed. Lonely Planet's previous Colombia guide was written by someone who later admitted to never having set foot in the country (search 'Lonely Planet Colombia scandal' if you wish to know more: it was featured in the UK Times, April 15th, 2008). It feels like this edition has been rushed out to protect the brand's reputation - the overall production and quality of the title feels hurried.
Information is up-to-date enough, but it feels lightweight and incomplete. Reading this guide and you would be forgiven for thinking that Cartagena doesn't have a beach in the city (it has numerous); that the Parque Nacional Tayrona is open whatever the weather (if it's windy, the entire park shuts and travellers are frequently turned back from its gates); that you have to pay a departure tax when leaving after short stays (you don't).
Of course, it's not the Lonely Planet's fault when places change: good hotels become bad and bad become good, but we found (almost comically) that most recommended places were quite poor, and vice versa. Occasionally though it seemed like the Lonely Planet writer must have been on an entirely different planet to the Colombia we visited: one example is there is no reason to stay in Finca El Pariaso in Parque Nacional Tayrona which is by far the worst value campsite/hammock ground, although the Lonely Planet describes it as 'nicely done'. In a different universe, maybe, but all the travellers we spoke to there felt universally ripped off.
The proofing of the book is just poor: it's not the end of the world if web addresses are frequently wrong, but it just looks like it's been shoved together when you see impossible URLS like 'domain.com/path/specificpage.com'. The indexing is frequently out at the back of the book. The whole thing is stuffed full of typos. As an additional criticism, there are just a few short pages of photos at the front - more wouldn't go amiss!
But the saddest thing is the book is just empty of the insider tips and tricks you expect from guides like this - from people and locals who really know the country. One such tip is never buy a bottle of water - only travellers shell out COP$1500 on a bottle whereas locals always buy water in bags (funny to use at first) for COP$300. It's stuff like this the guide is really lacking.
The kindest thing I can say is it's better than nothing.
Information is up-to-date enough, but it feels lightweight and incomplete. Reading this guide and you would be forgiven for thinking that Cartagena doesn't have a beach in the city (it has numerous); that the Parque Nacional Tayrona is open whatever the weather (if it's windy, the entire park shuts and travellers are frequently turned back from its gates); that you have to pay a departure tax when leaving after short stays (you don't).
Of course, it's not the Lonely Planet's fault when places change: good hotels become bad and bad become good, but we found (almost comically) that most recommended places were quite poor, and vice versa. Occasionally though it seemed like the Lonely Planet writer must have been on an entirely different planet to the Colombia we visited: one example is there is no reason to stay in Finca El Pariaso in Parque Nacional Tayrona which is by far the worst value campsite/hammock ground, although the Lonely Planet describes it as 'nicely done'. In a different universe, maybe, but all the travellers we spoke to there felt universally ripped off.
The proofing of the book is just poor: it's not the end of the world if web addresses are frequently wrong, but it just looks like it's been shoved together when you see impossible URLS like 'domain.com/path/specificpage.com'. The indexing is frequently out at the back of the book. The whole thing is stuffed full of typos. As an additional criticism, there are just a few short pages of photos at the front - more wouldn't go amiss!
But the saddest thing is the book is just empty of the insider tips and tricks you expect from guides like this - from people and locals who really know the country. One such tip is never buy a bottle of water - only travellers shell out COP$1500 on a bottle whereas locals always buy water in bags (funny to use at first) for COP$300. It's stuff like this the guide is really lacking.
The kindest thing I can say is it's better than nothing.
10 of 10 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
i have used lonely planets guides for 20 years it is obvious that this one is really bad..remember the last person to write it openly admitted that he did not go to many of the places he reviewed so LP had to quickly get 3 people to do this guide book. i think they threw 3 of them together and said lets do this thing fast. one bit of advice about aksing for discount on a bus made my colombian friend laugh. in bogota the prices are displayed on the bus and there is only one charge and no one asks for discount.
they did not say where you could meet other travellers in bogota apart from places you stay at, they use to say more about that. other people have said they have got many things wrong in their reviews again this all sounds like a rush job..but this also shows that LP has become a big business selling maybe millions of guides every year and big always turns out to be ugly. small is beautiful because the people that run it can control it but when it gets to a certain size they have very little control. the genuine feel of LP is dropping form the first guide they made in a kitchen to an international company. very sad
they did not say where you could meet other travellers in bogota apart from places you stay at, they use to say more about that. other people have said they have got many things wrong in their reviews again this all sounds like a rush job..but this also shows that LP has become a big business selling maybe millions of guides every year and big always turns out to be ugly. small is beautiful because the people that run it can control it but when it gets to a certain size they have very little control. the genuine feel of LP is dropping form the first guide they made in a kitchen to an international company. very sad
Format:Kindle Edition
I have just spent six weeks in Colombia as part of a year long backpacking trip to South America. I was not expecting full accuracy on prices as the guide is several years old. My main disappointment is that it contains very little additional information not included in the Lonely Planet South America on a Shoestring guide so is not worth buying in addition to it. The conversion to kindle format is lazy and severely impedes the usefulness of this guide, with maps unable to zoom but dividing into quarters, and the navigation button skipping between chapters not towns resulting in a lot of scrolling. This is a shame - the LP Chile kindle guide did not have these issues. Given LP's woeful history on Colombia guides it really should have been more careful with this one.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
A good travel guide
I like the Lonely Planet guides in general because they have all necessary information. The rate is only 4 because it is my personal problem with small font :-). Read more
Published 4 months ago by Natalia Kozyakova
Lonely Planet Colombia
Hopefully this will be just what I need for my forthcoming trip to Colombia. Unfortunately the new edition will be printed too late for me, but this edition is sufficient for my... Read more
Published 6 months ago by Mike
A reasonable guide
This book gives a nice general overview and covers the vast majority of the tourist areas and a bit beyond.
Published on 18 Mar 2010 by P. Cooper
An honest review of lonely planet Colombia
The news that one of the writers of this edition, hadn't actually gone to Colombia,'because Lonely planet hadn't paid him enough for the trip' was a little off putting. Read more
Published on 24 Aug 2009 by Rl Garcia
Wish there was more pix - but great up to date detail
Usual stuff, but most recently updated - which is really important. Don't want to trek for half a day to a place that's closed down.
Published on 5 Aug 2009 by N. fulwood
Listmania!
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