The Pre-Travel Guide Pre-Review

Posted on 09. Sep, 2010 by Steph in Resources, Reviews

There are a LOT of travel blogs out there, but I’ve always thought of Sofia and Nathan from As We Travel as two of the cool kids. While I’ve been sitting at home planning and writing about round-the-world travel, they are actually out LIVING it. Their site is one of my favorites; it offers a lot of useful backpacking tips- from travel guides to making the most of frequent flier miles to recipes you can cook in a hostel.

So when they asked me to review their new e-book, I was super excited to see what they had to say.

I was even more excited that I would get to review the “Pre-Travel Guide” while I am the very definition of a pre-traveler. I’m just gearing up for my round-the-world trip, so while I can’t tell you how well their suggestions pan out in the real world just yet- I still think I’m in a good position to judge this book’s usefulness.

First up, here is a description of the book in Sofia and Nathan’s own words:

This is a book for you, to help you prepare for your trip ­ examples from our own first RTW trip may pop up occasionally, but you’ll find that this book is a travel resource guide full of tips, ideas and advice to help you prepare for your own RTW adventure.

The book is 103-pages and contains some very specific and useful information that the couple gleaned from 8 months of travel. The information is all designed to help you plan and prepare for a trip. This means some original tips on how to save money, advice on figuring out where you want to go, and a nice section on how to pick out a proper backpack.

What I also found useful and unique was the sections they devoted to adjusting to life on the road. The cover things like dealing with your first month of travel, learning to travel as a couple, and a really useful looking travel work out. These sections set the book apart from most other pre-travel guides.

Not everything in the book is entirely useful. Some of the sections were a little too general to be helpful. If you’re laying out money to buy a travel guide, chances are you already know the answers to “What is Travel,” “Why Travel” etc. Additionally, while the book includes some detailed budgeting information for South East Asia, Oceania and Europe, no other areas of the world are included (presumably because the authors haven’t been there yet).

I’m a big researcher. I’ve read several pre-travel guides over the past year. Thanks to Nathan and Sofia’s thoroughness and unique outlook, I can say this is definitely the best one I’ve read. At a sale price of $9.95, its definitely worth a look!

Tags: book reviews