Re: Rick Steves

In my last post I stated that although I use Rick Steves material as one of my primary sources of Europe-related travel information, I don’t use it for everything. In the interest of full disclosure, I thought I’d briefly mention the two main areas that I don’t use Rick Steves for.

The first is food. I’m a notoriously picky eater, so food recommendations from Rick Steves guidebooks are usually irrelevant to me. The last time I was in Europe my diet consisted almost entirely of bread, bananas, yogurt, apples, cereal and occasionally eggs and/or meat. No doubt this horrifies any foodies reading this, but I’m not a “culinary traveler.” The other thing I normally don’t use Rick Steves for is accommodations, as his guidebooks are mostly focused on middle tier places like bed and breakfasts. I’m just looking for a half decent bed with a bathroom and safe place to store my backpack during the day, so on my last trip I did most of my bookings through Hostelworld (though, in their defense, Rick Steves guidebooks usually have a hostel or two listed in them for major cities).