Tours and Travel Books

of course anyone who lives in new york city can tell you where the white horse and cedar tavern are, but do they all know that where sam goody now stands on sixth avenue and ninth street is the very same place that the cafeteria kerouac wrote about extensively in visions of cody once stood?

this book is filled with a lot of well-known and plenty of not so well known places where various members of the beat generation ate, performed, lived, got drunk in, or otherwise played out their lives. the tours are broken down by area and there are clear directions to help you find where you're going (even if the place no longer exists). each tour also begins with a street map of the area covered and clearly numbered destinations, which was very helpful, although i did wish that the book had also come with an overview map of all manhattan and destinations so that i could more easily combine tours or skip around to places of interest if i didn't want to follow a complete tour.

each stopping place in the tour book includes a paragraph or two on why the place is important to beat history and who/what occured there. although the title of the book claims that new york was "jack kerouac's city," the tours really include many of the other important beat figures as well as a few others that were influenced by the beat movement, such as bob dylan.

this is a great way for beat aficionados visiting new york to get a taste of the city, and a fun way for locals to spend an afternoon or two discovering new spots and seeing familiar places in a new light.

Having moved to New York not long ago, I've been devouring the history and architecture of the city. This book blends the best of both, adding a third party to the mix -- literature. Dividing the city -- mostly Manhattan -- into eight two-hour walking tours, this guidebook offers literary references, beat-gen biographical information, and urban commentary in a useful, insightful style. The book is due an update -- the Gotham Book Mart has moved and several once-vacant lots are no longer undeveloped -- but this book has made for several wonderful walking weekends, and I know I'll retrace my steps in the future.

It would be next to impossible to find these places on your own. Even more impossible to learn as much about each of the sites as is presented in this guide. Each tour follows a logical route and there are plenty of stops that you probably never would have thought of--eg. Serpico's apartment, the former site of Thomas Wolfe's East 8th St. apartment. Using this guide is a great way to see the Village, East and West. And the insight will keep you reading even as you're moving to the next stop. Take your time. Spread the tours over a couple of afternoons. And linger for a while in Washington Square.

A great companion to this book is "The Beat Generation in New York." I wouldn't recommend carrying this heavy book around with you, but after you've finished the tours, open the book to look at the pictures taken at many of the places you've just visited.

Overall, this is an excellent guide book. Attempting to cover the entire state of California in a single volume, the authors freely admit that their "list" is incomplete and that they had to whittle the book down to include a limited selection of historical sites from among the hundreds found throughout the state. Fortunately, the coverage of the places that made the cut is excellent, providing plenty of background information about not only the mission, mansion, or museum itself, but also its place in California history. Websites are listed when available, allowing the visitor to check out updated information prior to a visit. My only recommendation would be that the authors consider publishing a second volume that would add in the many deserving sites that couldn't be included in this book.

If you're a California resident or library seeking a fine blend of California trivia facts and history and a travelogue to the state's best museums, then you can't go wrong with Best of California's Missions, Mansions and Museums. It functions like a travel guide by offering hours, costs, contact information and trip and tour itineraries for visitors - and it functions like a history book in providing a healthy dose of background history about each establishment. The 'don't miss this' tips are particularly well done.

Diane C. Donovan
California Bookwatch

Thanks to the Internet, it's easy these days to compile and publish lists of things, such as bed and breakfast getaways or suspension bridges or pet friendly parks, but rarer for authors actually to visit the venues they write about. That's what impressed me about "Best of California's Missions, Mansions and Museums" ($21.95 in paperback from Wilderness Press) by Ken and Dahlynn McKowen out of Sacramento.

The couple, along with Dahlynn's two children, 9-year-old Shawn and his sister, 14 year-old-Lahre, hit the road for four months, visited some 200 sites and racked up 10,000 miles on the odometer. The result, after some editing, are chatty descriptions of 135 family-friendly California missions, mansions and museums. This is a good guide to consult if one is planning a summer vacation in the Golden State.

The listings, write the authors, "provide a broad geographic and subject-matter selection of California's missions, mansions and museums, primarily as they relate to California's history and culture." Picking the "best" was difficult, subjective of course, and a lot of places were not included (such as most science and technology museums) that didn't meet the criteria of illuminating state history.

In the area of missions, "our final choice came down to 13 missions that we felt included not only wonderful museums, but retained much of their original or at least their early 20th century restored historic fabric. ... We chose our favorite mansions in much the same way as the missions, but we added accessibility -- how frequently they are open to the public for tours."

For museums, the authors concentrated on smaller collections. "We didn't choose them because of their size or the value or rarity of their collections, although we certainly considered those things. ... We considered their uniqueness, not only in the types of collections and the variety of artifacts, but also in how they relate to California's overall history or to their local community's history."

The book is divided geographically, from the North Coast, through the Great Valley and on to the South Coast and desert. Each section has a numbered locator map, trivia questions and introduction. Each two- or three-page entry features a "what's here" list, a "don't miss this" note, a description of the venue, usually a small black and white photograph and a box providing operating hours, cost, location and the Web site. The book also features an index and a list destinations by category.

The chapter devoted to the Great Valley includes entries for the Turtle Bay Exploration Park (including the Sundial Bridge) in Redding, and Chico's own Bidwell Mansion State Historic Park.

The authors note that the second floor of the mansion "features several of the home's 12 bedrooms. That was not a good location for bedrooms in a town where summer temperatures reach 100 degrees, and upstairs rooms become even hotter. Possibly, the plantation windows served as summer escapes to cooler sleeping arrangements on the outside balcony. The indoor toilets that Bidwell included were thought strange by his neighbors and visitors. Many believed that having to perform such bodily tasks inside a house, rather than in an outhouse, was unsanitary."

And there is some Great Valley trivia. "Where can you find the very first Pony Car (Mustang) manufactured by Ford?" It's at the Towe Auto Museum in Sacramento. The car is a white convertible, the first to roll off the assembly line back on April 9, 1964.

See you on the road!

Copyright 2007 Chico Enterprise-Record. Used by permission.

What a great book! It's both fun and educational. Being from Pennsylvania, I especially had a great time reading it. It's inspired me to get in the car and visit some off the beaten path places. Great design! It's more than a travel guide, it's great photos and fun stories. I highly recommend it. Well worth the $.

Even if you never visit any of these museums, this is a fun look at some exceptional places in PA. The author truly captures the enthusiasm of those who want to share their passions for the off-beat or unique with others. The photographs capture the spirit of the museums as well, and really add to the reader's enjoyment.

As a proud Pennsylvanian, I love this book! How did *I* not know about a Shoe Museum? (my first stop!) Also, I never knew we had a Jimmy Stewart Museum! This book is an excellent road trip companion! Educational, funny and user friendly! Gas up, pick up your traveling companion, crank up the tunes, highlight your stops, and hit the road! Learn more about Pennsylvania's whimsical past, present and future!

I saw a review of this book in the New York Times. Knowing we were soon to relocate to the city, i thought it would help us get to know the different neighborhoods. What a great book. It is so easy to follow and the maps are great. We intend to explore lower Manhattan and use this book as a guide. I had planned to give this book as a gift to my husband but it never arrived on time. I was disappointed in the mailing process, but none the less, we are thrilled with the book.

If you'r'e wondering how to plan a brief excursion around lower Manhattan this is a delightful guide. I found it eased my burden as a visitor on a tight schedule. I chose my streets among the clever full-page illustrations because I enjoy looking up at the great old buildings. You miss a lot when you don't slow down at gaze on these wonderful facades. There was advice about choice places to shop and eat which are known only to the locals and little tidbits about past history.

WALKING with Robert Jay Kaufman after lunch is not good for the digestion. He is tall and has long legs that speed up when something engages his interest. He constantly jaywalks. He never takes more than a few steps before stopping to consider some element in the cityscape. And inclement weather, like the mini-monsoon that drenched the city a couple of weeks ago, is a minor inconvenience.

On Franklin Street in TriBeCa, between Greenwich and Hudson, for example, in the midst of that downpour, he ordered a halt. "Look at the Renaissance details - the arches and the verticals," he said of several buildings on the north side of the street. "You can see the egos of people who put up the buildings, all of which were built probably within 20 years of each other. Each one tried to do something different, to get noticed."

Crossing the street, Mr. Kaufman pulled out a credit card, squinted along its edge to check the alignment of the window casements and decorative details of a tiny two-story brick house, recently restored, and pointed out where the builder had intentionally varied the scheme. It is that attention to symmetry and proportion, he suggested, that makes the little structure feel so right to a passer-by.

Manhattan has 1,544 blocks below 14th Street, or so Mr. Kaufman says. That number, like many things about the city's oldest precincts, is debatable; it depends, among other things, on how one defines "block." The City Planning Department, for example, estimates that Manhattan has 3,450 blocks, 1,100 of which are below 14th Street.

Still, Mr. Kaufman has earned the right to his opinion.

Mr. Kaufman's day job, so to speak, is heading the illustration and animation department at the Art Institute of Boston at Lesley University. But in the spring, summer and fall of 2003, this 54-year-old urban adventurer spent 52 days wandering back and forth over every one of those blocks. His circuitous ramble covered roughly 300 miles, during which he ran through three pairs of walking shoes and developed, he said, "legs of steel and feet of clay."

The tale of this trek along what he describes as "my Appalachian Trail with restaurants" is told in words and pictures in "Blockology: An Offbeat Walking Guide to Lower Manhattan," a new book that Mr. Kaufman wrote, illustrated and published through the aptly named Turning Corners Press, of which he is both proprietor and sole employee.

The book's theme is experiencing the essential downtown New York through the close, leisurely observation of the architecture and ambience of its blocks. It is a mission he regards as both humble and noble. City dwellers tend to take the block for granted, despite the fact that it is the fundamental element of urban space. Or as Mr. Kaufman puts it: "The block integrates society. It's the true marketplace."

"Blockology," though, is less a work of scholarship than of love. It is a work Mr. Kaufman felt compelled to create, and it exists as a testament to the hold that the city can exercise over the imagination, especially the imagination of an artist.

It is also a valentine to the city that gave Mr. Kaufman a name and whose publishing industry gave him a profession as an illustrator. Not surprisingly, given his romantic attachment to the place, it was also here that Mr. Kaufman met his future wife - a graphic designer named Susan Scott - at the Port Authority Bus Terminal, of all places.

No one knows what Mr. Kaufman's forebears were called before they immigrated to New York from Russia in the 19th century. Like many greenhorns, they swapped their old-country name for one that sounded more American. What is known is that the family thrived in the city and developed a fierce loyalty to it.

When he was a boy, in the 1960's, "there were tremendous fiscal and crime problems," Mr. Kaufman recalled the other day in a pouring rain, "and everybody seemed to be leaving for the suburbs." Even his own family had migrated to Chatham Township, N.J.

This audio tour of the Blue Ridge Mountains was much more than I expected. It was chock full of interesting facts and historical notes of the area and the people who first settled there. It was very well done, easy to follow and even humorous at times. I'd highly recommend it to anyone who wants to make a trip through this part of the country even more enjoyable. It turns a nice drive into a memorable learning experience. It's inexpensive and for the money represents very good value.

Travel Narrator's Blue Ridge Parkway audio tour brings out the best of this section of the Blue Ridge mountains. Travelers play the tape while driving the Blue Ridge Parkway between Asheville and Cherokee, North Carolina. This is not simply a look to your right, look to your left, tour. It teaches you about the history and landscape of the North Carolina mountains as you drive through them and it highlights key overlooks and hikes for you to take along the way. It's the next best thing to having a personal tour guide with you . . . and sometimes better. The tape is well worth it.

Travel Narrator's audio tour of the Blue Ridge Parkway is a MUST for anyone travelling the southernmost section of the Parkway for the first time. Those who know this section well will find the audio tour a delightful, useful companion.I have traveled the Parkway for over 30 years and have done extensive research for a Parkway course I teach, so I can assure that the historical information in the audio tour is extremely accurate. The Parkway is more than a scenic road; it is an interpreter of the region through which it passes. Trevel Narrator enables the listener to enrich his/her understanding of the Blue Ridge region. I hope this is only the first in a series of audio tours that will cover the entire Parkway.

Book hounds planning a visit to London shouldn't leave home without this title in hand: it is a virtual treasure trove listing new and used bookstores, libraries and specialty collections, and auctions, charity shops and more. Hours, tube directions, and specialties are covered in enough detail so any traveler can plan in advance. Indispensable.

I wanted a reference that would help me find the best second hand book shops in London so that I can plan my shopping and browsing whilst I am in that city in February. This book has it all - clear descriptions, addresses and tempting opportunities beyond my initial plans. If you going to London or live in London, and love books then Book Lovers London is perfect for you.

I bought this before a trip to London. It was quite helpful. I came back with an obscene haul of used books from stores I would not have found otherwise. For those interested in books who are going to London this will be a valueable asset to you.

We used this book throughout our vacation. The maps were great. Our favorite chapter was the one to Branson's free attractions. We would have missed a lot had it not been for this book and would recommend it to anyone.

Now this is a guidebook, written by Branson "local" Carol Shaffer. Branson's Best Day Trips mixes area history (better than any show!) and photographs with a complete guide to Ozark attractions from shows to inexpensive day trips in the area. After all, the Ozarks do not begin and end on the Strip; Shaffer takes you to surrounding communities, and provides 19 maps and detailed directions clear enough for even the most directionally-impaired traveler! To top it off, Shaffer's writing style is delightful. We highly recommend this book.

Wow, what a great book! I can't believe how much information is in here. Carol obviously knows the area and I think she was able to explain a little of the background behind the different places without becoming a history lesson. I also think the maps are very clear and plenty easy to read and I think the text was well written. I especially like the section on how to navigate the various side-roads (if you've been to Branson you know how bad the traffic can be). I went on vacation to Branson before but only got to see a third of what is in this book - now I can't wait to go back again!

There are directions and other info for finding and visiting lighthouses. They do not always show all lights for a given area. The photos are all color. I own 3 of these books. There are not many other guide books out there so if you are looking for guide books these are good to have. Since there are so many books in this series I thought I'd help people find them easier. This is the series.
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American Lighthouses
California Lighthouses
Eastern Great Lakes Lighthouses - I own this one
Western Great Lakes Lighthouses - I own this one
Southeastern Lighthouses - I own this one
Southern Lighthouses
New England Lighthouses
Mid Atlantic Lighthouses
Gulf Coast Lighthouses

I am a lighthouse lover and this book is the best refence book for lighthouses of California. It leaves very little out and is quick and easy to read. Perfect for the coffe table or bedside table. I recommend this whole line of lighthouse books to everyone.

I am a lighthouse lover and this book is the best refence book for lighthouses of California. It leaves very little out and is quick and easy to read. Perfect for the coffe table or bedside table. I recommend this whole line of lighthouse books to everyone.

Kim Grant has undoubtedly composed quite a thorough and resourceful guide to Cape Cod! This book covers all the towns along the Cape as well as the two islands - Martha's Vineyard and Nantucket. One will find information about sightseeing, shopping, dining, activities, etc.

I picked this book instead of Frommer's or any of the other travel books because Grant made it quite clear that she personally went to each and every place that is in this book - so she didn't merely compile the listings of businesses along the Cape, she went and saw them each with her own eyes. Hence, the book has more of a personal touch to it. It is quite evident that Grant spent a great deal of time putting together the valuable information which comes in pretty handy for those touring the Cape.

An excellent resource indeed!! All people who travel the Cape, regardless of the degree of knowledge you possess (or don't possess) of the Cape, have this book with you!

As a lover of the Cape; I enjoy finding new places to explore when I go there. This book has given me that and more. Ms Grant (no relation to me) gives a very personal look at places to see, places to eat, and places not to miss. I couldn't put it down. I found things in this book that I've never seen on the Cape before and I've been going there for over 20 years. Ms Grant gave very easy to read, accuarte details, phone numbers, websites and names. I've found in each area of the Cape she gives a brief, yet thorough description of stores, specialty shops, restaurants, ice cream shops. She has also included Museums, Courthouses, even Cemeteries. Also included is Medical Information. Motels, Hotels, Bed n Breakfasts, Cottages. Tennis, Golf and Miniture Golf Courses. Times, places. When they open in the spring, if they're open all year round, when they close in the fall. There was a great little specialty shop that I visit each time I visit the Cape. It wasn't in the book. So I emailed her and told her. She visited there, as did her mother and it was in the next edition she published.

Before I purchased this guide, I was able to use it in a cottage I stayed at recently. I found it extremely helpful and truthful, so I felt I needed to own it myself. I bought two and gave one as a gift. I highly recommend this if you are traveling to Cape Cod.

For Colonial America:
I'm a history NUT, and this one feeds the addiction well. It came with me on a lengthy trip recently and was pretty much my guide throughout. Excellent for finding the right B&Bs and unique Colonial accommodations that I wanted.

We take trips by car every summer on the east coast, and try to work in as much education as we can for the kids, while still keeping it entertaining for me and my wife! For our trip to Williamsburg this year, we had a hard time choosing a guide, but we took this book with us along with our maps and a more general guide to Virginia. We were suprised to find that Clint Johnson's book provided all the general information we needed, along with things that weren't in the regular guide. It was a great resource for recommendations on places to stay and eat during our trip, that were really the type of authentic places we were looking for. It's also full of color photographs. We highly recommend it for anyone looking for a thorough companion on a trip to Williamsburg.

I recently read this book and only wish I had more time and money to travel! The author is very detailed about so many different sites, even some lesser known locations of great historical significance that I had never been aware of. I have seen other books specifically about Rev. War sites, but this book goes much further back in time with many colonial and pre-rev. war sites, such as the Lost Colony at the North Carolina coast. Another thing I like is that when listing nearby lodging, the author rarely mentions the average modern hotel chains, but instead lists the small bed & breakfasts or country inns that best invoke the mood and feel of the time period of the specific historic site that they are near. This is a great way to travel. I would highly recommend this book to history buffs out there planning their next vacation/historical tour.