Rating: 
Summary: Excellent, concise travel guide
Review: As indicated in his book, the author does not try to pack anything and everything into his travel guide. Rather, he tries to winnow things out and focus on the important highlights of a particular country. That is why this book was so appealing to me. Other books are like heavy tomes that contain more facts and information than you need and are not likely to remember. I think Rick Steve's cuts to the chase. My only criticism of his book is that I found the restaurants he recommended to be uneven. Some of the restaurants were good and others were simply average at best. I felt that his other recommendations as to sights, entertainment and accomodations were very good.If you have never been to Spain or Portugal before, I would highly recommend this book. If, however, you have been to Spain before or plan to spend several days in just a few cities, you should consider another travel guide that contains more detail.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent, concise travel guide
Review: As indicated in his book, the author does not try to pack anything and everything into his travel guide. Rather, he tries to winnow things out and focus on the important highlights of a particular country. That is why this book was so appealing to me. Other books are like heavy tomes that contain more facts and information than you need and are not likely to remember. I think Rick Steve's cuts to the chase. My only criticism of his book is that I found the restaurants he recommended to be uneven. Some of the restaurants were good and others were simply average at best. I felt that his other recommendations as to sights, entertainment and accomodations were very good. If you have never been to Spain or Portugal before, I would highly recommend this book. If, however, you have been to Spain before or plan to spend several days in just a few cities, you should consider another travel guide that contains more detail.
Rating:
Summary: Marred By Errors
Review: If this book only discussed travel, I'd give it a 5. Like all of Rick Steves' travel books it has good, practical advice. There is good practical information on hotels, restaurants, sites, local transportation, and travel strategies. But it's marred by some factual errors. Some errors represent a failure to keep the book up-to-date. For example, the stop for Bus 89 from Barajas airport to downtown Madrid has changed. The bus is a good deal, so check with information before hunting for the stop. Contrary to the book's appendix, the Socialists do not control Spain's national government. The Popular Party has been in power since 2000. Other inaccuracies reflect gullibility, or an attempt to indoctrinate. The architect of Ronda's impressive bridge did not fall off of the bridge to his death while inspecting his work. This is a false rumor. Franco did not know in advance of the saturation bombing of Guernica. Both sides of Spain's Civil War committed atrocities. The truth is bad enough; no need to swallow propaganda. The worst error is the claim that Spain's court resisted Columbus because it didn't believe that the world was round. This is what historian Daniel Boorstin called a "vulgar legend." By the 15th century educated Europeans knew that the world was a sphere. The Spanish court resisted Columbus's proposals because they thought he underestimated the size of the world and the length of the voyage. They were far closer to the truth than Columbus was; if Columbus had not stumbled across a New World his voyage would have perished at sea. My tour guide in Grenada got this right; so should a travel writer. This is particularly egregious because Rick Steves probably knows better. A post on his web site pointed out this error in the 2002 book. Indifference to facts does a disservice to both history and readers. History needs to be based on facts, not gross errors. Readers have a reasonable expectation that an author knows his history. If you're planning a trip to Iberia and take its history with a lot of salt, this book is worth purchasing. I'd give this book 3.5 stars if I could, but will give it a gentlemen's 4. Hopefully next year's edition will correct the errors.
Rating:
Summary: Marred By Errors
Review: If this book only discussed travel, I'd give it a 5. Like all of Rick Steves' travel books it has good, practical advice. There is good practical information on hotels, restaurants, sites, local transportation, and travel strategies. But it's marred by some factual errors. Some errors represent a failure to keep the book up-to-date. For example, the stop for Bus 89 from Barajas airport to downtown Madrid has changed. The bus is a good deal, so check with information before hunting for the stop. Contrary to the book's appendix, the Socialists do not control Spain's national government. The Popular Party has been in power since 2000. Other inaccuracies reflect gullibility, or an attempt to indoctrinate. The architect of Ronda's impressive bridge did not fall off of the bridge to his death while inspecting his work. This is a false rumor. Franco did not know in advance of the saturation bombing of Guernica. Both sides of Spain's Civil War committed atrocities. The truth is bad enough; no need to swallow propaganda. The worst error is the claim that Spain's court resisted Columbus because it didn't believe that the world was round. This is what historian Daniel Boorstin called a "vulgar legend." By the 15th century educated Europeans knew that the world was a sphere. The Spanish court resisted Columbus's proposals because they thought he underestimated the size of the world and the length of the voyage. They were far closer to the truth than Columbus was; if Columbus had not stumbled across a New World his voyage would have perished at sea. My tour guide in Grenada got this right; so should a travel writer. This is particularly egregious because Rick Steves probably knows better. A post on his web site pointed out this error in the 2002 book. Indifference to facts does a disservice to both history and readers. History needs to be based on facts, not gross errors. Readers have a reasonable expectation that an author knows his history. If you're planning a trip to Iberia and take its history with a lot of salt, this book is worth purchasing. I'd give this book 3.5 stars if I could, but will give it a gentlemen's 4. Hopefully next year's edition will correct the errors.
Rating:
Summary: Pros and cons of a very good guidebook
Review: Some thoughts about Mr. Steves' largely excellent book. Highly recommended. Pros: * Mr. Steves provides excellent help in prioritizing your time in Spain and Portugal. I find this activity to be the hardest when planning a trip. How many days in Barcelona, how many in Madrid, etc? * An incredibly valuable feature of the book, in my opinion, is that Mr. Steves provides a one-page listing of the primary sites in each city, ranking each site from zero to three stars based on how important it is to see each site. While I may not agree on his prioritization, the page makes for a quick checklist while you're walking or waiting for public transportation. * Mr. Steves is particularly good at recommending out-of-the-way lodging and restaurants that you might not otherwise find in a given place. * Mr. Steves' book is also very good for budget travelers, providing lodging and dining in every class of service. Cons: * As mentioned in several other reviews, the book is laden with historical factual errors. I won't go into that here. * In a cutesy manner, many of the maps are handwritten and the street names are omitted. Specifically, if you try to drive around Sevilla using only this book, you will live to regret it. * Much if not most of the visitor information (hours and days of availability) for tourist sites is wrong. I strongly suggest doing what we did: arriving in a particular town the night before you wish to visit its sites, walking around to see the real hours displayed, then planning your itinerary over dinner. Some other thoughts, not particularly specific to his book but useful for your trip: * PORK: Spain is completely obsessed with pork. More or less every menu item has pork on it. Even if it says vegetarian and you ask if it's vegetarian and they assure you it's vegetarian, the odds are pretty high that it'll have a six ounce hunk-o-bacon in it. If you are committed not to eat pork for any reason, seriously consider whether it's worth having to cookies out of a bag for the duration of your trip. * There are department stores called Corte Ingles scattered around every city in Spain. They have grocery stores and everything else you might need. Knowing where they are is very useful on a long trip. Best of luck!
Lydia
Rating: 
Summary: A book that will talk you out of going to Portugal
Review: Surprising for an RS travel book. I've used his books heavily in planning many a trip. His team usually does a nice job of providing a balanced view of a country or city. This one showed mostly the unpleasantness and mediocrity of Portugal. Can't speak for the Spain section, as I'm not considering travel to Spain in the short term, and did not review that as carefully.
Rating:
Summary: Big disappointment for highly touted book ...
Review: This book would only be useful if I were travelling to Spain. And even the 3 days I spent there, not a single word was mentioned of Bilbao, Valladolid, and the northern Atlantic cities. Very dissappointing. The book reserves all of about 30 pages on Portugal, none of which provide nearly as insightful as the Lonely Planet or Michelin guides. My advice, save your money and buy something else.
Rating:
Summary: Big disappointment for highly touted book ...
Review: This book would only be useful if I were travelling to Spain. And even the 3 days I spent there, not a single word was mentioned of Bilbao, Valladolid, and the northern Atlantic cities. Very dissappointing. The book reserves all of about 30 pages on Portugal, none of which provide nearly as insightful as the Lonely Planet or Michelin guides. My advice, save your money and buy something else.
Rating: 
Summary: What happened to Valencia?
Review: This guidebook contains useful information for the places highlighted by the author. It's coverage of Spain, however, is limited to the author's specific itinerary. I would expect any guidebook that has "Spain" as it's title to at least provide cursory coverage of Valencia and the Costa Blanca region in eastern Spain. These areas are not even mentioned.
Rating: 
Summary: Useful info and new secrets
Review: This is a great book that really highlights the important information about a trip to Spain and Portugal. Rick has selected some great places in the big cities and fantastic little places on the verge of being discovered. His section on Portugal's Algarve is especially great, leading you to hide-away places that will some day be overcrowded because of their beauty. [...]
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