Back in August, I was over-consumed with planning a trip to San Francisco for my family. I had traveled to San Fran a few times before, but never with kids.
I went online and searched for anything and everything kid-friendly: hotels, attractions, restaurants, etc. I read reviews, compared Top 10 lists, checked what parents had to say and planned our visit accordingly. It was a lot of work, but for the most part everything went well.
Then, a month later, I received press copies of Lonely Planet‘s new Not-For-Parents travel series, The Travel Book: Cool Stuff to Know About Every Country in the World and London: Everything You Wanted to Know.
The Travel Book offers kids one-page synopses of every country in a colorful, image-packed layout featuring brief factoids about history, food, culture, landmarks and more. The entry for Canada includes information about totem polls, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, Hockey and igloos. For the United States, it talks about tornadoes, the Statue of Liberty, baseball and Mount Rushmore. It’s a great snapshot of the world and may even get children itching to travel more.
Which leads me to London. Although fewer than 100-pages, this travel guide highlights all the fascinated features of the city, again in an intriguing, easy-to-read layout that captures a child’s (and parent’s) imagination. Stories dedicated to Harry Potter, punks, ghost trains, murdered royalty and common folk, London Bridge and on and on are accompanied by photos, thought bubbles, sketches, maps and cartoons. If you’ve been to London as an adult without the kids, a trip with children and this guide will offer a new perspective of the city and lead you to places you’ve likely never been to before and to details you’ve never heard of before.
The City Series of books also includes New York, Paris and Rome. No San Francisco yet. But I’m sure there will be one by the time we go again. At least I’m hoping so.
The Not-For-Parents Travel Book and Not-For-Parents London, published by Lonely Planet Publications, 2011. Available at Amazon.ca: The Travel Book, $15.87 and London, $12.26.
Heather Camlot 