only the lonely

I checked out Lonely Planet Alaska from the library, planning a trip in June to visit my brother, and stumbled across--that is, "discovered"--this irritating paragraph:

McCarthy is "an erstwhile ghost town so funky and cool you'll want to haunt the place yourself....The tiny community is a car-free idyll...Alas, in the past few years the place has been 'discovered,' but the summer population still hits only about 200..."

Discovered? Really? By who? Lonely Planet writers and readers, by any chance?

I love how they talk up the town in glowing terms that can only be described as guaranteed backpacker bait, then complain about it being "discovered" and overrun by tourists!

I suppose it's a danger of the job. If you’re a travel writer who discovers cool places and doesn't write about them, you're not doing your job, and you're selfish for keeping the information to yourself. But if you write about it, you're ruining the place you love. I guess they suffer from the fear that if they don't write about it, someone else will, and then they'll seem unhip and out of touch.

When I first started travelling alone I followed guidebooks almost religiously. It was mostly out of fear; I was afraid of missing out on a must-see experience, but also when travelling alone I didn't want to take risks.

But the older I get, the more I dislike travel guides. I use them for some history and background, and information on the attractions I'd hate to miss, like what hours the Louvre is open. I could find all this information free on-line, but it is convenient to have it all in one place.

What I hate is everything else that pads out the books. Where to shop! Where to eat! Where to drink! They tell you exactly where to stand to get the must-have keepsake photo, exactly what to buy to have a unique souvenir. Except how can it be unique, since everyone else who has read the book has one exactly like it? (Except for Spurtle who I am sure is one-of-a-kind and was crafted specially for me out of pure love.)

The one thing they leave out is the one thing I really, really need: where to use the bathroom for free. Seriously, a list of public restrooms would be way more appreciated.

Also, most places that are touristed at all have many things concentrated in one area, where you will easily stumble across them. I mean, restaurants, bars, and shops tend to be centered, obviously, in places where people go. If you visit New York, you're not going to starve for lack of places to eat, drink or spend money.

(Of course, as a budget traveler, I'm usually fine grabbing a slice of pizza or whatever the local hole-in-the-wall is selling, I don't need to seek out the best fine dining options. Also I have not yet travelled to a place so remote that there were only three restaurants in a hundred-mile radius and without a guidebook alerting me to their presence, I’d starve. Unless you count Wyoming.)

But say you are a sophisticated traveler who doesn't want to eat at the tourist traps set up for your convenience. No, you want the off-the-beaten-path experience, the little restaurant no one knows about, tucked away on a quiet side street...you know, where the locals go! Because you're not a tacky tourist, you're an enlightened traveler! A citizen of the world!

Yeah, I've done that. First of all don't kid yourself; just because you don't wear a bulging fanny pack doesn't mean you're not a tourist. Second, I've tried this, and found the off-the-beaten-path place entirely populated by other “travelers not tourists” trying unsuccessfully to hide their travel guide in their pocket while they attempt to blend in with the locals.

So you kind of can't rely on a travel guide or website to tell you about things no one knows about. You'd have to be the first person to buy the first copy of the first edition of the book, hot off the press, and then travel there the next day. The Internet makes finding quiet places even more impossible.

After that it's too late. The tiny restaurant or quaint boutique is not equipped to handle hordes of people and becomes overwhelmed. Soon locals stop going there--they can't, because unlike vacationers, they live there, they have jobs and families and thus cannot afford to spend three hours waiting on the sidewalk for the perfect meal, they have to go home and get ready for work tomorrow. Voila, your quaint local bistro is now a bona fide tourist trap!

This happened to DiFara's pizza, a tiny place with maybe 3 tables that was featured on the Food Network and now has two-hour waits for a slice. While it is good, it’s not worth a two-hour wait. I mean, almost nothing is THAT good. Even if you've never had a slice of pizza, or are about to die and eat your last slice of pizza, I don't think it's worth two hours.

But then again I'm the kind of person who tends to value things less the harder I work for them. I know this is counterintuitive but I can’t help it. Every time I've busted my ass to achieve something, at the end, I look at the finished product, accept the accolades, and think, "Eh. It wasn't worth the hassle. I could have been watching reruns of 'Buffy.'"

Thus, if I'd just walked in off the street to grab a slice, I'd have taken one bite of DiFara's and thought I was in heaven. After waiting on the sidewalk for two hours, well, this pizza now has some serious expectations to live up to. I've sacrificed for this pizza. I've acquired a sunburn for this pizza. It better not just be, you know, really good pizza, it had better be magical, ecstatic pizza, capable of replenishing my 401K, improving my complexion, rewriting my love life, and making me a better person.

I guess I feel a bad case of Fooled Me Twice Shame on Me. I have more than once dutifully followed travel writers' advice and wasted hours wandering around lost, hungry but refusing to eat at the many perfectly adequate places I passed, convinced my foreign experience simply would not be complete unless I tried this exquisite local delicacy which only ONE restaurant could prepare properly. Again and again I fall into the "you MUST eat Joe's BBQ, and only Joe's BBQ!" trap, the "Do NOT leave town without trying Sam's fried chicken!" imperative, only to find myself stuck in a crowded dump with a bunch of other sweaty tourists, eating mediocre gunk I could probably find at home. Toto, I think we're back in Kansas!

I think if people truly want an "authentic" experience they need to stop reading travel guides and either ask a local, or find it themselves! Since I am cursed with a complete lack of sense of direction, I find stuff that's off the beaten path all the time. I wouldn't exactly say I go looking for it, though. The trick is to get so lost that you wander until you're on the verge of collapse. Then, no matter where you end up eating, it will taste like the most wonderful food in the world, because when you're tired and your feet hurt, everything tastes good!

So, tomorrow I'm off to Fort Lauderdale on a business trip. I've been to Florida several times, every single time against my will. I hate hot weather and I hate the beach. When you sunburn in less than 20 minutes, the beach is hardly relaxing; it's more of a constant battle. I cannot let my guard down for even half an hour, or for the next three months I'll be peeling my skin off in sheets. I have been so convinced I'll be miserable I haven't even bothered cracking open a travel guide. I figured I'll be working most of the time and spending my free time avoiding sunburn.

Then tonight I broke down and peeked inside my old USA road trip guide. From what I can tell, the only thing to do in Fort Lauderdale is watch cruise ships depart. When I asked a colleague who has been there before, he told me there is great outlet shopping.

I guess guides are useful, after all. I think this is the first time I've read a travel guide and felt reassured that I am missing absolutely nothing!