Lonely Planet - guiding budget travellers for years
No discussion of budget travel is complete without mentioning the Lonely Planet guides and website, which have been offering good advice and information to budget travellers for years.
Starting out as the first popular series of travel guides for backpackers and budget travellers, Lonely Planet has grown to be what is probably the largest independently-owned travel guidebook publisher in the world. In 2004 alone, the company published a prolific 650 titles in 118 countries. Lonely Planet sells more than six million guidebooks per year.
Lonely Planet is based in Melbourne, Australia, which is hardly surprising given that so many inveterate backpackers hail from the antipodes.
Lonely Planet was born when Tony and Maureen Wheeler, based in Sydney, wrote “Across Asia on the Cheap”, in 1973, after travelling from the UK, across Europe and then Turkey, through Iran, Afghanistan and Pakistan, then on to India and Nepal, and finally reaching Australia
Lonely Planet then went on to produce yet more guide books which catered mainly to the younger end of the travel market, and aimed at mainly those from Australia and the UK. At that time the overland “hippy trail” between Australia and Europe, via South-East Asia, the Indian subcontinent and the Middle East was very popular, and was fast becoming the equivalent of the “grand tour” for adventurous young people, particularly for young Aussies and New Zealanders, who would take months and even years to do the journey, frequently combining it with a spell of working in London too.
One of the company’s most best-selling books remains “South-East Asia on a Shoestring”, which has sold well year upon year.
If you really want to know about a place before you go, Lonely Planet is the key.
