The National Geographic Traveler: California

 (9 customer reviews)

As expected, this book has some of the best photographs and illustrations available. What was more surprising in a travel guide was the quality of writing, the great social insights, and the historical contextualization. While Critser touches all the necessary points of interest, he also discovers hidden marvels from excellent cheap restaurants to the often unsung corners of L. A. If you are going to buy one guide, this is it.

Recently we visited California for the first time. We covered San Francisco, LA and San Diego in one week. We had planned everything before-hand using the National Geographic Traveller and our experience is it turned out very useful in that respect. It exaclty tells you what is a must see and what looks good from where. So we were prepared and we expected certain things. For e.g. this book says that the views from Coit Tower are breathtaking and they really are so. We had to walk up from China Town to Coit Tower on the very steep streets of San francisco. But once we were at Coit Tower the views of the city were excellent. This book also mentions some driving tours which are very useful. One thing I would like to mention here. We had rented a mustang convertible to drive the Calif Highway One along the coast. Our friends recommended to take the 17 mile drive on our way and we were surprised why it was not mentioned in this book. But after driving through the seventeen miles we...Read more

As a Californian I'm always a bit cynical of these type of travel books. They tend to run towards the cliche. Not this book. Mr. Critser takes us to places that only someone with imagination would, Monterey Park and not just Monterey Coast, Euro Pane and not just La Brea Bakery. The lovely Balboa Park in San Diego is given equal weight to San Francisco's Presidio. I loved reading the front part of the book that covered in such beautiful style the history of the amazing state. This is a book that I will keep on my shelf for me and for out of town guests. I hope to see National Geographic use more of this intelligent personal style in both their books and in their magazines. Bravo Mr. Critser!