Frommers 500 Places to Take Your Kids Before They Grow Up

Product Review

Frommer's 500 places to take your kids before they grow up

2nd Edition

500 Great Reasons to Say,"Are We There Yet?"

This bestselling guide takes you across town and around the globe to 500 of the mostexciting places on earth. With more than 40 new destinations, this revised edition is packed with things to see, do, and explore—from the Painted Desert (United States) and the cave homes of Coober Pedy (Australia) to a camel safari (India) and Dracula's Castle (Romania).

Complete with hotel information, age recommendations, Web sites, and more, this guide provides the advice you need to plan a trip the whole familycan enjoy—and remember for a lifetime.

Places to Go & Things to Do Around the World

The natural world: awesome vistas, flora, and fauna
Offbeat attractions: weird and wacky fun
History: from ancient wonders to modern marvels
Rides and thrills: bobsleds, dogsleds, andeverything in between
Art and architecture: galleries, buildings, andmonuments
Science: space centers, natural history museums,and more
Sports: halls of fame and sporting events

Amazon.com Review

Product Description

500 Great Reasons to Say,"Are We There Yet?"

This bestselling guide takes you across town and around the globe to 500 of the mostexciting places on earth. With more than 40 new destinations, this revised edition is packed with things to see, do, and explore—from the Painted Desert (United States) and the cave homes of Coober Pedy (Australia) to a camel safari (India) and Dracula's Castle (Romania).

Complete with hotel information, age recommendations, Web sites, and more, this guide provides the advice you need to plan a trip the whole family can enjoy—and remember for a lifetime.

Places to Go & Things to Do Around the World

The natural world: awesome vistas, flora, and fauna
Offbeat attractions: weird and wacky fun
History: from ancient wonders to modern marvels
Rides and thrills: bobsleds, dogsleds, and everything in between
Art and architecture: galleries, buildings, and monuments
Science: space centers, natural history museums,and more
Sports: halls of fame and sporting events

Look Inside Some of the World's Most Kid-Approved Places (Click for more information)

Sequoia & Kings Canyon National Parks: Giant Trees of the Sierras	Versailles: Palace of the Sun King	Biscayne National Park: Florida’s Homegrown Coral Reef
Howe Caverns	Liverpool Beatles Tour	Parc Guell: Super City Park
Sea Kayaking in Acadia National Park	Rollercoasters: Bigger Is Better in New Jersey	Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre

Product Description

The natural world: awesome vistas, flora, and fauna
Offbeat attractions: weird and wacky fun
History: from ancient wonders to modern marvels
Rides and thrills: bobsleds, dogsleds, andeverything in between
Art and architecture: galleries, buildings, andmonuments
Science: space centers, natural history museums,and more
Sports: halls of fame and sporting events

Customer Reviews

Average Customer Review

(50 customer reviews)

120 of 126 people found the following review helpful

Interesting but Unrealistic, August 17, 2006

Austinlvr "movie lover" (Merritt Island, FL USA) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)

This review is from: Frommer's 500 Places to Take Your Kids Before They Grow Up (Paperback)

I had high expectations for this book but they fell flat. First, the layout is o.k. but not great. Areas are grouped by categories such as "Out and About" and "On the Water." As the book covers the world, I think it might have been better to be laid out geographically and maybe cross-referenced. As for the selections, they are very diverse. Some make sense but some I really don't feel are appropraite for children, except for maybe the very well travelled child. For example, number 397 is Mount Fuji: Scaling the Symbol of Japan. The age range is 8 and up. The author writes, "Take a shortcut directly to Kawaguchiko's Fifth Stage by bus from Shinjuku Station (be sure to book in advance); the trip takes about 2 1/2 hours. From this starting point it's about a 6 hour climb to the summit, with another 3 hours to make the descent; at the top, a 1-hour hiking trail circles the crater. The highlight of the classic Fuji Climb is to watch the sunrise from the peak, which in summer...Read more

76 of 81 people found the following review helpful

Aspirational list, January 31, 2007

penguinblue (CT USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Frommer's 500 Places to Take Your Kids Before They Grow Up (Paperback)

I'm surprised by the number of negative reviews of this book so I thought I would offer my own counterpoint. This is the best list I've found of aspirational places to take children. The only comparable list book I've found is the ever-popular 1000 Places to See Before You Die, which isn't oriented around kids at all. Of course they will all want to go to Disney World, but this is a different type of list. These are places that kids should visit to understand more about the world, how people behave, how science works, and what life is like for people who aren't always like themselves. It is not a list of fun places to take little kids.

We've been lucky enough to have visited 97 of the places with our kids, now aged 15 and 20. It's been a blessing to us to be able to visit places like Thailand, which is wonderful, and the Great Barrier Reef and indeed Mount Fuji and Hiroshima. People in Japan take many kids ages 8 to 10 to the muesum at Hiroshima; it's a fantastically well...Read more

65 of 74 people found the following review helpful

A fairly useless book, January 11, 2007

IndyDon (Indiana) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Frommer's 500 Places to Take Your Kids Before They Grow Up (Paperback)

Wow, was I disappointed when I cracked this book open. My two main complaints are layout and site selections. I cannot believe that sites are grouped by general similarity rather than geography. The geographical index at the back of the book just does not satisfy me. Any book like this should be organized from a geographical standpoint in my opinion. You will be required to look at the geographical index at the back of the book to find anything specific. I was hoping the book focused on the US or let's be wild and say North America. While I did not count them up, I would guesstimate that almost half of the sites are outside of North America. You would have to be extremely wealthy to visit many of these places and a fair number really are not place where I would want to take "kids" as they would only appeal to high school age or above. There are better books out there - in this case the Internet would serve you better.