Customer Reviews:
 A small booky. but big on information December 17, 2002
34 out of 34 found this review helpful
For anyone new to Scotland who is intending to do some travelling around this is a cracking book. It covers just about any area of information needed from fauna & flora to transport options, general medical advice and detailed walking plans complete with maps. Even if you are not intending to do the walks it is still worth having just for the general information provided. Walking however, as the title implies, makes up the main part of the book and is very well done. Each walk is dissected, starting with a historical overview of the area and leading to information about what maps to take, the nearest towns, what to pack and a detailed description of the route. There is a small map for each walk, which gives a general idea of the terrain but this is not suitable for proper route planning or following. This book is an ideal introduction to Scotland with the benefit of also having details of the best walks in the UK.
Compact encyclopaedia for independent walkers April 2, 2002
38 out of 39 found this review helpful
For independent walkers planning a trip to Scotland, this book is a portable encyclopaedia. It covers a huge range, from easy walks to exposed ridge-walks and mountain ascents, from a short half-day hike to the Southern Upland Way (two weeks). As you would expect from Lonely Planet, the authors are strong on environmental issues and thorough on practical information. In 408 pages of densely-packed text they cover the whole of Scotland; the secret of easy access is to use their handy 4-page table of walks organised by region. There is a useful index and glossary, and each walk is supported by a small-scale contour map. It seems churlish to criticise such a worthy volume for offering too much, but do walkers really need so much detailed data? Price and contact information obsolesce very quickly, as LP clearly knows, and such crowded pages are hard to read in poor light or on a train. You need two strong hands to hold the book open, and even so the gutter is so narrow that you lose the ends of lines of text. As a one-stop resource for walking in Scotland, however, this book is superb value.
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