Traveling with MP3/iPod Audio Tours.

Used them for Florence and Venice. They were great.

Used them for Rouen and parts of Paris! Absolutely, YES!

I used the RS ones in Paris and they were great. Also, since it's essentially verbatim of the self-guided tours in the books, it saved us having to carry the books around open so we had our hands free.

Thank you, all! AKF - good point about the books, etc. Didn't think of that! :)

My wife and I used Rick's audio tours for Venice, Rome, Florence and Paris last summer. That's a lot of Rick, but we enjoyed them all and recommend them. We brought 2 iPods and had them on both. A few tips:

• Be sure to print and carry the maps that go along with each of these tours. Even with the maps, you may occasionally get confused about what object/building/artwork Rick is describing. This was particularly true for us at the Roman Forum -- that map isn't very clear, unfortunately. It took us forever just to find the first stop.

• You may also find that some of the museum pieces he describes have been removed/replaced since the tour was recorded.

• Our iPods displayed a photo that corresponded to each "chapter" of Rick's audio tour. This was very helpful in helping you identify the next stop, so make sure your MP3 player can display these photos. The iPhone/iPod Touch has a nice large screen, which was especially useful.

• The Venice "Grand Canal Cruise" tour was probably the most difficult to deal with, since the boats run at a different speeds than his tour, something he admits on the recording. The information in this tour is pretty marginal, so that's potentially one you could skip.

• Make sure you bring along the necessary adapters to recharge your MP3 players at night.

P.S. The only place we reserved a guided tour was St. Peter's Basilica, which was mainly because it helped us to avoid the lines. It was enjoyable. Even there, when the tour guide took us into the Sistine Chapel, we listed to Rick on our iPods, since the tour guides are not allowed to speak inside the chapel.