Guidebooks

Vietnam Cambodia Laos & the Greater Mekong (Multi Country Guide)

Vietnam Cambodia Laos & the Greater Mekong (Multi Country Guide)
Nick Ray
Lonely Planet
ISBN: 9781741047615
Date: 2007-09-01
Price: $24.99
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Editorial Reviews

Discover Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos & the Greater Mekong

Take a slow boat down the mighty Mekong past remote jungles, ancient temples and intriguing hill-tribe villages, p.23
Get up close and personal with wild elephants in Laos, p.285
Trek to secluded waterfalls through Khao Yai National Park in Thailand, p.156
Explore magnificent Angkorian temples without the crowds in Cambodia's Preah Vihear Province, p.223

In This Guide:

Full-color chapter on the region's ancient wonders, from majestic Angkor Wat to World Heritage-listed Lijiang.
Border crossings chapter to help plan your adventure, with info on which borders are open and a map with marked crossings.
Visit lonelyplanet.com for up-to-the-minute reviews, updates and traveler insights.
What Do Customers Ultimately Buy After Viewing This Item ?
Thailand (Country Guide)
Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia Travel Map (Globetrotter Travel Map)
Southeast Asia: On a Shoestring
Cambodia (Country Guide)
Myanmar (Burma) (Country Guide)

Customer Reviews

4 Perfectly adequate for a short Southeast Asia tour ( 2009-11-24 )
We just returned from a three week trip to Thailand, Laos, and Cambodia. We spent about 10 days in Thailand, one week in Laos, and only four days in Cambodia at Siem Reap visiting the Angkor Wat complex. As we only had time on this trip to hit the highlights, this book was just fine. We actually brought along the Lonely Planet Thailand book and for such a short trip, it was too big and definitely in the way. If you're really backpacking and traveling for many weeks or months through Southeast Asia, I wouldn't recommend this book (buy the individual country books), but for a standard vacation it was a great resource.

3 Good guide but bit disjointed ( 2009-10-15 )
Lonely Planet guides are very good but this one is a bit disjointed. Information on visas is located in a few different areas for the same country & is not very clear. Otherwise it is a very good guide.

2 The Worst LP I've used ( 2008-10-22 )
First off, I almost always stick with Lonely Planet, been through 25 countries with them. now:

No info at all about Bangkok's domestic airport, other than one line about "domestic flights fly from, Don Mueng." As a book for backpackers and by backpackers shouldn't it at least give a little transit info about the hub of all the budget airlines in Thailand?!!?

And that was just my first day...

I struggled for three weeks trying to find info I needed (even the basics) which seem to be omitted for no reason other than replacing it with useless info.

I know the editor just combined small snippets of the single country books to make something sorta useful, but he succeeded at creating a pointless book which I lugged around in my bag and kept having to ask other travelers to borrow their LP Laos or LP Thailand.

My recommendation, by the single country guidebooks

3 A decent starting point ( 2008-08-01 )
I spent six weeks in May and June 2008 backpacking around Southeast Asia, and this was my primary guidebook. Overall, I found it to be helpful for the macro-level stuff: planning my itinerary, getting a general overview of each country's history, and budgeting.

I give it three stars, however, because although it's unreasonable to expect it to be as in-depth as the individual guidebooks for Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos, I often found that the authors omitted useful listings for lodging, places to eat, and sites that were included in other books.

If you plan on taking only one guidebook for VN, KH, and LA, this is a good choice. (Another option is Moon, but at the time of my trip it was even more out-of-date than the LP guide.) Just keep in mind that you'll want to refer to other guidebooks, which I found to be readily available from hostels, cafes, and other travelers in this well-traveled region.

1 Worthless crap that only takes up precious space in your pack... ( 2008-05-17 )
Don't purchase this book...if you do, you're essentially throwing fifteen bucks (US) out the window.

I spent six weeks in Cambodia and Vietnam, and deep-sixed this book when, for one city, "OUR PICK" for hotels was a place costing $200 per night.

I can overlook the faggoty carbon-neutral ethos of the LP franchise, which permeates every one of their guide-books--let's face it, that encompasses a healthy percentage of backpackers who buy these books--but TWO-HUNDRED BUCKS PER NIGHT?!

Save that for Fodor's or Frommer's. Why the hell is any LP book even LISTING a place that wants $200 a night...especially in CAMBODIA?

On the island of Koh Rung Samloen off Sihanoukville, Cambodia, I mentioned to the English owner of the Lazy Beach Resort that I had this edition on me. He expressed a desire to see it, and spent an hour laughing at the entries for Sihanoukville.

The LP writer apparently came to Sihanoukville and spent THREE HOURS talking to ONE guy, asking about the hotels, getting recommendations, and so forth.

Some of that information is flat-out erroneous, such as calling the manager of the Oasis bar "professional," when he is, in fact, nothing of the sort. Some of the hotels have been sold, or are under new management, (things are very transitory in Sihanoukville), or are nothing like what they've been described as.

(The Lazy Beach Resort is not listed in this edition, but it is the best place to spend any--ANY--time in the Sihanoukville environs.)

This book was equally useless when it came to Vietnam. I encountered an American fellow at the Bavet border-crossing who told me he'd "jettisoned [this edition] a long time ago."

The Lonely Planet has led me astray before, viz. their Bolivia book, which recommended an unsafe hotel in La Paz, and completely screwed up the map of Sucre, but this book was the inflection point that made me re-evaluate whether they are the best option for independent travelers.

As the owner of the Lazy Beach Resort said, the LP's main utility is the city maps (excepting, of course, Sucre), but their listings are simply one guy's opinion or outright hearsay...and not always accurate when you show up tired and dirty late at night.

I'll still use the LP for future trips, but as one tool among many, not as a Bible.

(The best travel resource for Cambodia--by far--is the Canby website...I used the LP 2005 edition for Vietnam and found it only adequate, relying more on Wikitravel and other travelers' apercus.)

Flag of Cambodia Cambodia
Capital: Phnom Penh
Currency: Riel (KHR)
Language: Khmer
Time Zone: UTC+7
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