Fiji guidebooks

I have a copy of the LP 2003 edition of Fiji and want to update. With all respect to our hosts, I would like peoples opinions of the new edition as compared with the Moon publication by the venerable Mr. Stanley.

In case you're interested, the new edition of Moon Fiji is due out this summer (norther summer, mid-year).

So from that point on it will be more recent than the latest LP.

That said, I found the curently existing Moon guide pretty accurate too - DS just seems to put more time/effort into updating his book than LP authors do.

The Moon guide is certainly more detailed, and covers many places LP doesn't.
Which matters if you like to go off the beaten track, but much less if you have the Yasawas on mind.

I haven't seen the new LP Fiji, I guess there is a new one out? If it was written by Rob Kay or Errol Hunt it will be good. Can't vouch for any other of their other authors.

But you can't go wrong with anything David Stanley writes about the South Pacific, he is the expert.

A lot of recent So. Pac. LP guides have been simply updates of older books that were originally good---like Rob Kay's Fiji---but the authors doing the updating are sometimes So. Pacific novices, who come to an island group for three weeks and think they are experts. And since they are just updating other writers who often have a totally different style of writing, it gets a bit weird at times. The original ones may have taken certain aspects of the country more seriously, or understood it much better, the updaters are flip and sarcastic about the same things. So, as with anything, theri are good updates and bad updaters.

But since David always does his own updates, you always know what you are getting. You may disagree with some of his politics, etc., but what he does write will be consistent, accurate and thorough. Well, at least that's my opinion, having visited/lived in the islands for 30 years now, and having read most books about the islands.

Raro

There we go again Laszlo! When I started typing my reply, no one had answered yet! Then when it's posted, you're four minutes ahead of me. I guess I type too slowly!

:-)

[L=Latest LP Fiji guide][/L] - from June 2006.

It's by Justine Vaisutis - guess what, it's her first and only book about the South Pacific... ;-)

But she has also authored LP guides on Oz, Africa & Canada - a true World Expert she is!

Damn!

Latest LP fiji guide link

info on the author

Two years ago, Moon was accurate and informative, and LP sucked donkeys, IMHO. I left LP at home and carried the Moon, which we abandoned as we continued RTW, and when I got home and reread the parts of LP that covered where we'd been in Fiji, it was even more obvious how bad it was. Unless the update involves more than a new cover picture and frontspiece and some cursory updates based on reader feedback, it will be a useless rip-off.

5--I agree. We've had "world experts" re-write the Cook Islands LP book, and it goes downhill every time.

Is Justine the miserable one with husband and unbelievably bad mannered kids? I came across a woman (with kids and husband) who wrote for the LP a few years ago in Fiji and she didn't quite look like she enjoyed actually anything she was doing.

I've decided at the last minute to add Fiji to my RTW trip.... mainly because the BA Qantas ticket now offers it.
I'll be travelling by myself so will be looking for a few friendly/cheap places to stay i.e. good hostels.
I do enjoy to party but would like to take in a bit of the cultural side of things too.
What is a good lenght of time to spend there... I was thinking a couple of weeks.

thanks

Ben

Justine, who wrote the latest Fiji guide, has now also contributed her talent to the latest Indonesia one, where she is actually the coordinating editor.

She has written some amazingly silly stuff, the pick of which is this one.

It is akin to listing a ferry from Victoria in Australia to Tasmania in NEW ZEALAND! ;-)

Looks like LP is starting to become the National Inquirer of the travel world!

Do the Wheelers still own it/run it? I thought I read somewhere about another person who was now running things.

They have also picked the photo of a Green Iguana (found only in South America) as one of the 6 pics representing INDONESIAN fauna in the photographic Highlights chapter, and added the caption "Iguanas are found in parks like Taman Nasional Bali Barat".
They must just LOVE that iguana, it already represented "Indonesian" fauna in the previous edition, too - back than alongside a Macaw parrot (ditto from South America).
That's akin to putting a kiwi in the Fauna chapter of the Cook Islands' book to illustrate local birdlife! :-)

But one would think the coordinator does at least know where the country she is publishing about ends and its neighbours start.
Appearently not any more...
Wait for Justine, and next time you will be pleased to learn from the books there is now a regular ferry route from Tahiti in French Polynesia to Bora Bora in the Cooks! :P

LP today is a huge guidebook factory.
The Wheelers still own it, but I dubt any single person could oversee the whole operation.

And they probably don't need to worry too much about accuracy as they know that 99% of travellers/tourists will buy their books, no matter the quality.

It's not just LP. According to Tripadvisor the # 4 rated hotel in Papeete, Tahiti is the Kia Ora Sauvage which happens to be located on one of Rangiroa's motus.

Silvano---
Yes, Tripadvisor has some standard format, and rarely changes anything. They kept listing places here on Rarotonga as "in Avarua" when they were ten miles from town! They did correct a few backpacker places they had listed under "Resorts", but even that took a while a and a few cites to the Tourist Office website to get that done.