Wine Trails: 52 Perfect Weekends In Wine Country

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From Lonely Planet, the world's leading travel guide publisher, Wine Trails, the first book in Lonely Planet's "Perfect Weekends" series, introduces the secret gems in well-known regions such as Napa and Sonoma, Tuscany, Burgundy and Rioja, and also explores off-the-beaten-path regions in Georgia, Greece and beyond. Detailed itineraries recommending the most interesting wineries and the best places to stay and eat in 52 wine regions near major cities make this perfect for travel enthusiasts who enjoy wine. Winemakers offer personal insights into what wines to taste and why they're special and help you to understand a place, its people and their traditions through the wine that is made there. Gorgeous photography, maps and in-the-know authors complete the package. Authors: Lonely Planet, Mark Andrew, Robin Barton, Sarah Bennett, Lee Snider, John Brunton, Bridget Gleeson, Virginia Maxwell, Jeremy Quinn, Helen Ranger, and Luke Waterson. About Lonely Planet: Since 1973, Lonely Planet has become the world's leading travel media company with guidebooks to every destination, an award-winning website, mobile and digital travel products, and a dedicated traveller community. Lonely Planet covers must-see spots but also enables curious travellers to get off beaten paths to understand more of the culture of the places in which they find themselves. 'Lonely Planet. It's on everyone's bookshelves; it's in every traveller's hands. It's on mobile phones. It's on the Internet. It's everywhere, and it's telling entire generations of people how to travel the world.' -- Fairfax Media 'Lonely Planet guides are, quite simply, like no other.' - New York Times Lonely Planet guides have won the TripAdvisor Traveler's Choice Award in 2012, 2013, 2014, and 2015.

Hardcover: 320 pages

Publisher: Lonely Planet; 1 edition (October 20, 2015)

Language: English

ISBN-10: 1743607504

ISBN-13: 978-1743607503

Product Dimensions: 7.3 x 1.2 x 9.4 inches

Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)

Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (34 customer reviews)

Best Sellers Rank: #174,851 in Books (See Top 100 in Books) #76 in Books > Travel > Food, Lodging & Transportation > Dining #145 in Books > Travel > Food, Lodging & Transportation > Road Travel #157 in Books > Cookbooks, Food & Wine > Beverages & Wine > Wine & Spirits > Wine

The premise of WINE TRAILS is the assertion that “Tasting wine in the place it was made can be a revelation.” With that in mind, this Lonely Planet guidebook takes the reader through 52 perfect trips in 20 countries where you can spend the weekend sampling wine in the place where it was made. So you could ostensibly use this book to plan an entire year of globe-trotting, wine-infused weekends – if you’re made of money, anyway.There’s really not a whole lot of specific information in this very large, heavy, hardcover book. The book is divided into 20 sections, reflecting the 20 countries being covered. Each section provides a brief overview of one or more specific wine regions, plus a few paragraphs on a number of vineyards in each, and a sidebar on places to stay, restaurants, and area events. Honestly, there’s little here that isn’t more easily available online; the write-ups just seem very thin, with few details and nothing to distinguish them from generic blurbs. For example, the section on the Francis Ford Coppola winery in Sonoma is two paragraphs long – not even one full column on a three-column page. If you actually wanted to visit this winery, you’d certainly head for the website, so the best this book can do is point you in the right direction.There are a lot of pictures in the book, including photographs and cute graphics (i.e. maps rendered in the shape of wine bottles and suitcases). The maps are pretty much useless, and they take up quite a bit of space that would be better spent providing more detailed information on the wineries. Some of the photos are attractive, but others are somewhat baffling – one, taking up a half-page, just shows a woman opening a bottle of wine; another, covering two full pages, shows a man walking through his grape vineyards. Again, fewer photos and graphics and more detailed information would have made the book more useful to someone who truly hopes to visit these places.And finally, the tiny typeface used for page numbers and photo identification numbers (teeny, tiny numbers on each photo link to the specific winery being illustrated) are almost impossible to read. As my husband pointed out after leafing through the book, “This is not senior-friendly!”Overall, this is an attractive book that might be of interest to wine connoisseurs and wishful travelers. As an American reader I was disappointed that only 45 pages (of 319) were devoted to the United States – and of that, only four states were represented (California, Oregon, Washington, and New York). It’s unlikely I’ll be able to take a weekend wine trip to Chile, Morocco, or Slovenia, but I might be able to swing one to a US winery. And there are some really nice wineries in many states other than the four covered here. Then again, I shouldn’t complain – France only gets 40 pages!This isn’t a bad guidebook. It just isn’t what I hoped it would be.

I’ve gotten many travel guides through Vine over the last several years. Some of them fell well short of being useful or informative in favor of pandering to today’s ADHD readers. I’m slowly realizing that the days of actual travel books, the thick, well-thumbed, dog-eared ones that you toss into your backpack and schlep along with you on your travels, are numbered. When all the information a traveler could need is available with the swipe of a fingertip, who needs books? I accept that, although I don’t have to like it.“Wine Trails,” while not as bad as some of the current crop, is a case in point. I really don’t see much use for it.In covering wine-producing regions in 20 countries, it necessarily scrimps on the breadth and depth of material on any one place. Each of the 52 regions gets about six or eight pages of text and photos containing a short introduction to the region itself and then brief descriptions of a handful of wineries in the region (I wonder what criteria Lonely Planet used to decide which wineries to include). The obligatory “Essential Information” sidebars contain some pointers on lodging, restaurants, activities and local celebrations. Again, this information is so superficial that it is of little possible use to a traveler planning to visit the area.And the maps—don’t get me started on the maps! Someone’s idea of “clever” graphic design was obviously much more important than usefulness of the material; the “maps” in each section are inside templates defined by the outline of a wine bottle. A tiny circular inset of the country with a red dot on it is supposed to provide context. Well, it doesn’t work at all, in my opinion. The maps, which should be a hallmark of a travel guide, are useless.I also question the accuracy of the information in “Wine Trails.” I haven’t traveled to all of the regions covered, of course, but I have been to some of them, and the statement on Page 312 that Seattle-Tacoma is the nearest major airport to Oregon’s Willamette Valley is wrong. Portland would be surprised to learn it doesn’t have a “major” airport.My three-star rating reflects my opinion that “Wine Trails” is not a bad book to flip through to find wine regions that might be interesting to visit, but it’s not very useful for trip planning. For that, I guess it’s back to the Internet.

This is a wine journey throughout 52 wine destinations. If you are in the mood to travel and have time and funds to do so then this is the book for you. I'll probably not hit all these destinations, but reading through the pages gets there with stunning images and details of what to do, where to stay and how to enjoy yourself without the stress associated with travel. It's a perfect coffee table book to for wishes and dreams and to see different regions across the globe. It certainly does not go into detail but skims the surface of each wine trail, most of which you can find online, however it is a nice reference book that will peek a wine enthusiasts interest.

This is not a Lonely Planet guide book. It was not written as such either. This is a companion book to 52 Weekends of Wine Tasting. This is a large book that will help you plan your trip, not one that you are going to take with you on your trip. Lonely Planet offers smaller books that are actual guide books for that purpose for each region. While this does offer a lot of information kind of guide book style it is meant more as a primer to peak your interest on various regions or areas.It does offer advice on the best places to stay, wineries, along with reviews of said places and wineries. Beautifully illustrated and photographed.

There is no little detail provided that it's almost not worth even reading this book. There are 52 different weekends that cover wineries, places to stay and a few restaurants in 20 different countries. It reads very similar to a AAA tour guide book but without the star ratings. I wouldn't bother purchasing as every bit of information could be gleened from google maps. Which is what this book appears to have done. This is a big pass. It's a big heavy book but no true useful information.

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