Kindle

I have a Kindle and I downloaded Rick Steves guidebooks for Istanbul and Greece before we left for our last trip in September. I also downloaded the Kindle app on my ipad. So my husband and I could both follow along as we did the various tours in Istanbul and Athens. The newer Kindles are great as they have a touch screen and you can enlarge the maps. We always used the books before but we are using electronic versions from now on. Cheaper and not as heavy to carry around

Glad that we did for recent trip to Croatia-Slovenia-Hungary-Austria-Czech Rep. IT WAS A GREAT HELP!

We've just returned from Rome, Venice, and Florence from a two-week trip. We both have a Kindle Fire and we downloaded all of Rick's guides and used every one of them in each city. The best was the Sistine Chapel ceiling where Rick detailed each panel. We had booked a Friday night entry to the Vatican Museums limited to 150 from 7-9 PM and another 150 from 9-11PM We stayed over until 11PM, which was OK, and practically had the Sistine chapel for hours to ourselves along with Rick's detailed descriptions. Others sat down nearby to listen to the ceiling panel description on our kindle. Rick Steves'Audio Europe came in so handy, especially the 5 downloads for Rome.

I think Rick Steve's downloadable podcasts are great. I would recommend using ear phones so as not to annoy others. My husband and I shared a split jack earpiece and found a place to sit in the Sistine. So much better than a guide and less expensive too and no difficulty with guides who aren't proficient in English.

I had to buy the Kindle version of Italy book on my RS trip Italy My Way..... because someone at the first
hotel in Venice took my hard-copy book grrrrrrrrrrrr
Anyway I personally found it very difficult to follow along with the tour using the Kindle Fire,
because there are no page numbers and it is all hyper-linked.
I finally gave up. - because the guide/escort on the tour would refer us to page xxx and I of course could
not find that "page" until long after she had moved on to another topic.

I loaded the RS guides to Amsterdam and France on my Kindle before going there this fall (not a RS tour). Saved a lot of weight and bulk, but harder than paper guidebooks to jump around and find things on the fly. I accessed items mainly by highlighting, but it still was awkward. I seldom even tried to read the maps, relied on paper for that. On balance, I'd say the Kindle was better than guidebooks, plus of course it held other reading material. I'll take it traveling from now on.