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Episode Notes
Alternative Title: Lonely Planet Guidebooks from pre-internet days to Instagram + new etiquette tip + some guidebook alternatives
Amy opens the show with her recent experience as a tour guide in the Seto Inland Sea islands. She also introduces a new Japanese manners tip, a result of her etiquette skills being put to shame recently when she traveled with Japanese people on a business trip.
From there she delves into the new Lonely Planet guidebooks and gets a little nostalgic about the older pre-internet publications and tells why they were better than the new editions. She then pivots and tells us why the new Lonely Planet destination guidebooks are better than the old. In other words, neither is better or worse; the changes are more a reflection of the times (good riddance to tiny fonts!).
At the end of the show, for those old-schoolers who prefer the old LP guidebook style, she introduces Cicerone guidebooks to fill the gap: fewer photos, but better maps. Less Instagram, and a more hands-on approach. And the quality of writing a rare find in guidebooks.
Links to content mentioned in the podcast:
Island-Hopping in the Kasaoka Islands, Amy’s article on small remote islands in the Seto Inland Sea with populations of 30-500. She also wrote a book about these islands.
Lonely Planet Shikoku Pilgrimage
Cicerone Guidebooks
Hiking the Japan Alps & Mt. Fuji
Japan’s Kumano Kodo Pilgrimage
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