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Lonely Planet travel guides have a cult following amongst back packers and budget travelers and rightly so, no other travel guides are so slanted to this style of traveler
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Before reviewing my current copy of L/P Myanmar it may be useful to add a little info. on the company.

Background Lonely Planet began in 1972, created by Maureen and Tony Wheeler; after traveling extensively this couple realized there were no travel guides for the young budget traveler and proceeded to create what is now the largest independent travel guide publisher in the world. Lonely Planet promote an image of culturally sensitive, non destructive, eco- friendly tourism.( whether mass budget traveling actually produces this is extremely dubious)

The Lonely Planet website http://www.lonelyplanet.com/ : is huge and very popular, it has a tremendous amount of up to the moment information supplied by travelers via email and chat, on just about any destination. It also has another unique feature , that of free instant update downloads on the last latest edition of any guide. An example, I bought the current edition of the Myanmar guide published in January 2000 and by visiting the website downloaded about20 pages of updated material which I could print off and add to the guide.
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The Myanmar (Burma) guide book.

On a recent trip to Yangon I had a chance to test the utility and accuracy of this book at least the parts relevant to my trip.

It was the only reference I carried so I was dependent on it entirely and found it lacking in some areas, but generally useful and accurate with some strong exceptions.

My complaints were : the street map of Yangon was almost impossible to read and some suggested eating stops were not as claimed.( O.K. I will allow this over sight as it is impossible to keep up with the fact of restaurants changing hands and so on)

The rest of the book including general information and the standard photographs, is well presented perhaps a little lacking in detail and heavy on politics, the authors making no bones about being greatly in support of the champion of democracy Aung San Suu Chi and greatly opposed to the current regime.

Final word
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Lonely Planet guidebooks are aimed at the budget traveler not the well heeled visitor but most people on any budget would find this guide useful in planning a trip to this country, it remains the benchmark in Asian travel guides.


Recommended: Yes