BootsnAll Travel Community

Hi - I'm off for several months wandering Mexico, so I need to pick up a couple of guide books. I usually like Rough Guide and I know everyone gets Lonely Planet (although I usually avoid LP).

I'd like to hear suggestions from those who have actually used the Mexico guides. Any others I'm missing? Thanks!

Long before Lonely Planet was even in business, we all used The People's Guide to Mexico

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Originally posted by static:
Long before Lonely Planet was even in business, we all used The People's Guide to Mexico

LOL. I've never been to Mexico, not currently planning to go to Mexico, but somehow I have that book. And I didn't buy it.

What is interesting about that book is that it does not tell you where to go in Mexico, it tells you how to go to Mexico.

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Long before Lonely Planet was even in business, we all used...

static's been going to Mexico since before they invented movable type. And I second the People's Guide rec, though I also use an LP for the logistical crap, bus info, maps etc. Like right now, I'm going to book a ticket this afternoon and am trying to decide which airport to land in to most conveniently get me to where I actually want to go. Yay.

My guidebook preference where I can get it (especially in Latin America) is Footprint. Perhaps unfortunately for you, their Mexico coverage is in a book called 'Mexico and Central America' - this was perfect for me as I was going to CA after Mexico but if you're sticking just to Mexico maybe you'll want an exclusive book. Still, Footprint books have thin pages and they pack tons of info onto each page.

I'm also an LP boycotter, and while I very much want to like Rough Guides, I find that they are not great on the practical things (they don't give bus times, for example, just something like '3 daily,' and usually don't provide enough cheap accommodation options).

If the publication year was the same (this is important to me), of the three, I'd take FP every time.

People's Guide is great. All we had as a backup was a teany tiny German Guide book (Marco Polo, runs under 100 pages). Since a lot of the hostels have guide books sitting around, I would take a peak into them once in a while and that was really enough.

PS the current People's Guide is a bit old but there's a new edition (number 14 I think) coming out in November.

This thread was very informative, thanks to those who shared. I had no idea Peoples guide to Mexico existed.

I guess I don't have quite the same hang-ups as others about Lonely Planet - especially since their maps alone are worth the price of the book (well, almost). More importantly, the newest edition has - if I'm not mistaken - just come out, so it will probably be the most up-to-date guide on Mexico for the time being.

Incidentally, I find Octavio Paz's "Labyrinth of Solitude" to be an evocative look at the country, if you're interested in seeing it through the eyes of one of its most prominent thinkers.

Chris

I'll be boring and also chime in on The People's Guide to Mexico. It's the best guidebook ever written, in my opinion, precisely because it gives you the inside scoop and then pushes you out of the nest to go figure the rest out on your own. The country is so big that any of the others tend to just give you a crappy overview that is not very worthwhile. There's just too much to cover and so they just provide a very surface level impression and leave it at that. The LP Yucatan one, for instance is unbelievably bad. You could spend two weeks in the area and provide better advice than that book does. The competitors aren't much better though, unfortunately.

Have not seen the Peoples guide recently, though I recall it was low on details, and very good for cultural information.

So, I might supplement that with a Footprints guide for Central America and Mexico, and then copy out the maps from a Lonely planet guide. Then you'll be complete...