Footprints Cusco and the Inca Trail Handbook

Rating:
Summary: An excellent guidebook
Review: Have used many guidebooks over the years. This one is excellent. Good background and history, well organized and concisely written. Reliable information on hotels and restaurants and on getting around. It could provide more and more reliable information on shopping with less of an emphasis on handicrafts.

As for most guidebooks, the authors sometimes get carried away by their own enthusiasm for the place.

But still a great guide along with its sisters we used on the same trip for Peru, and Ecuador and the Galapagos and the South America and Africa Footprints we have used on other trips.

Rating:
Summary: This is a valuable and good guide, but not a great guide.
Review: This edition is ripe for update (the information in this guide is more than three years old). The lodging and restaurant profiles are adequate, but dated.

I live near Cusco and have seen new and better accommodations, restaurants and dives open up. When I was in Cusco, in May, 2003, Footprint was there researching the next Cusco edition.

The one constant is the information on the attractions and ruins - timeless. Ben Box is at his best describing and touring the spectacular antiquity of Cusco, Machu Picchu and surrounding areas.

When it comes to profiling tour operators, Ben Box is superb. Especially consider his profiles if you are hiking the Inka Trail or want to see Manu Reserve (only 10 lic. operators). He has also highlighted some of the NGOs working with abandoned children and environmental issues - applaudable indeed.

The best place in Peru for up to date information is the 'South American Explorers Club' in Cusco (Lima has a club house too). The address given in this edition is old, SAE moved over a year ago. The new address is 188 Choquechaca #4, Cusco (Tel. [phone])

On the downside, the index is paltry and this guide lacks an accommodations or restaurants index. Thus, if you have a recommended restaurant you want to look up in a large city (Lima, Cusco etc.) you have to go through all the restaurant pages 'til you stumble across the name you seek or miss seeing it completely.

The publisher's use of paid advertisements for hotels, tour companies, calling cards and travel services (over 20 ads in this guide - many full page) are intrusive and causes one to question the integrity of the guide, when the same company with a full page ad is profiled and recommended by the author.

Also disturbing and disappointing is Ben Box's quick gloss-over of the rising crime in Cusco. Last year there was a rash of taxi robberies and rapes. The police in Cusco are a joke. Anyone with a car and who sticks has "TAXI" written on the front window is not questioned by the authorities. Thus, criminals cruise in private cars with a "TAXI" sticker and prey on unsuspecting tourists, especially women. Ben Box's coverage of crime and safety in Cusco is basically non-existent. Much better is the more recent 'Footprint - Peru' Guide.

These things noted, Instead of this guide I would encourage you to consider the 'Footprint - Peru' Guide 4th Edition (make sure it is the 4th Ed.). The "Peru" 4th edition has much more than this guide has and is more current. However, when Footprint brings out, the soon to come, Cusco 2nd edition, then I would strongly consider that guide.