Buckingham Palace, Stonehenge, Manchester United, the Beatles – Britain does icons like nowhere else, and travel here is a fascinating mix of famous names and hidden gems.
Lonely Planet will get you to the heart of Great Britain, with amazing travel experiences and the best planning advice:
Inspirational images, 3D illustrations, city walks and recommendations from our expert authors
Planning features and top itineraries to help you plan the perfect trip
Local secrets and hidden travel gems that will make your trip unique
Plus comprehensive history coverage and features on food and literature
Coverage Includes: Planning chapters, London, Canterbury, Southeast England, Oxford, Cotswolds, Southwest England, Cambridge, East Anglia, Birmingham, the Midlands, the Marches, Yorkshire, Manchester, Liverpool, Northwest England, The Lake District, Cumbria, Newcastle, Northeast England, Cardiff (Caerdydd), Pembrokeshire, South Wales, Hay-on-Wye, Mid-Wales, Snowdonia, North Wales, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Southern Scotland, Stirling, Central Scotland, Inverness, Northern Highlands & Islands, Understand and Survival chapters.
Author Info
Neil Wilson:Like almost every other Lonely Planet author he knows, Neil fell into the guidebook-writing business by accident. Having fled the rat race of the oil industry only four years after graduating as a geologist, he returned to university to do postgraduate research. But academia turned out to be just as dull and constricting as industry, so like any sane person he decided to give it all up to be a penniless freelance writer.The penniless bit was easy. On the writing side, Neil got a foot in the door producing articles on history and culture for a Scottish magazine, while attending a business course and sleeping on a friend's settee. The friend's flatmate just happened to be an editor with a guidebook publisher in Glasgow. Neil submitted a portfolio of his travel photos and smarmed his way through an interview, and next thing he knew he was off to photograph Corfu for a guidebook.That was 1988; since then Neil has written and photographed more than 80 guidebooks for several publishers, including HarperCollins, AA Publishing, Berlitz and Lonely Planet. He has written or cowritten around 50 guides for Lonely Planet, specialising in two geographical regions - the UK and Ireland, and Eastern Europe - and has also worked on the first editions of the Lonely Planet guides to Georgia, Armenia & Azerbaijan, Malta and Brittany.Neil has been an outdoors enthusiast since childhood and is still an active hill-walker, mountain-biker, sailor, snowboarder, fly-fisher and rock-climber. He has climbed and tramped in four continents, including ascents of Jebel Toubkal in the Atlas Mountains of Morocco, Mount Kinabalu in northern Borneo, the Old Man of Hoy in Scotland's Orkney Islands and the Northwest Face of Half Dome in California's Yosemite Valley.Peter Dragicevich:After spending nearly a decade between Sydney and London, Peter once again calls Auckland, New Zealand his home – although his current nomadic existence means he's hardly ever there.Over the course of a dozen years working for newspapers and magazines he honed his skills as a travel writer, even when trapped in management roles – including five years as Managing Editor of Express newspaper in Auckland, another five years as the General Manager of Sydney Star Observer and a stint as the General Manager of Studio Magazines, publishers of Black+White, Blue, Studio Brides, Studio Bambini and several other coffee-table mags.He finally gave into Kiwi wanderlust, giving up staff jobs to chase his typically antipodean diverse roots around much of Europe – spending time in his grandparent's villages in Croatia, Scotland and northern England.Over the last decade he's written literally dozens of guidebooks for Lonely Planet on an oddly disparate collection of countries.Even so, his devotion to New Zealand makes the North Island his pick for the best tourist destination – encompassing great beaches, an alpine desert, beautiful native bush, spectacular lakes and wonderful wine regions.Belinda Dixon:Only really happy when her feet are suitably sandy, Belinda has been (gleefully) travelling, researching and writing for Lonely Planet since 2006. It’s seen her marvelling at Stonehenge at sunrise; scrambling up Italian mountain paths; horse riding across Donegal’s golden sands; kayaking down south Devon rivers; gazing at Verona’s frescoes; soaking in a spa in Bath; fossil hunting on Dorset’s Jurassic Coast. A trained radio journalist, her innate nosiness means few likely-looking sleep spots go unexplored. And then there’s the food and drink: truffled mushroom pasta in Salo; whisky in Aberdeen, Balti in Birmingham, grilled fish in Dartmouth; wine in Bardolino. And all in the name of research …Marc Di Duca:Hi, I'm Marc Di Duca, Lonely Planet author and general travel fanatic. To date I've worked on Lonely Planet guides to Russia, Trans-Siberian Railway, Cycling Britain, Germany, Bavaria, England, Great Britain, Ukraine, Eastern Europe, Europe on a Shoestring, Austria, Poland and Madeira as well as tens of other guides for other publishers. Catch me online at marcdiduca.com or Facebook to find out where I am and what I'm up to at the moment.Oliver Berry:Oliver Berry is a writer and photographer based in Cornwall. His first trip abroad was to the south of France at the tender age of two, and since then his travels have carried him to Corsica, New Zealand, the South Pacific and the midwestern USA.Along the way he has learned a few useful skills, including how to catch Fijian sand crabs with your bare hands, the best way to avoid falling into a crevasse on the face of a glacier, and an excellent Samoan recipe for home-made mosquito repellent.Oliver first started writing for Lonely Planet in 2002, and has written for many titles including France, Great Britain, England, Western Europe, Rarotonga & the Cook Islands and South Pacific & Micronesia. He graduated with a degree in English Literature from University College London in 1999 and has written for a wide range of national newspapers, magazines, books, journals, encyclopedias and webzines. His writing has won several awards, including The Guardian Young Travel Writer of the Year and the TNT Magazine People's Choice Award.Andy Symington:Andy is an Australian freelance writer who has prowled the globe insatiably. After studying archaeology and psychology, he worked in the navigation business and, for some time, in educational and community theatre before long travels eventually saw him wind up in Edinburgh, selling whisky to the Scots.Andy first became involved in writing when someone cannily contracted him to contribute to a pub guide, and his formidable research on that title broke a man but launched a career.He has since written or worked on over a hundred books for Lonely Planet (especially in Europe and Latin America) and other publishing companies, and has published articles on numerous subjects for a variety of newspapers, magazines, and websites. He is the author of a novel, part-owns and operates a rock bar and is currently working on several other fiction and non-fiction writing projects.Andy moved to Northern Spain many years ago and lives in a place where the climate is described as 'nine months of winter, three months of hell'. When he's not off with a backpack in some far-flung corner of the world, he can probably be found watching the tragically poor local football side or tasting local wines after a long walk in the nearby mountains.Catherine Le Nevez:Catherine's wanderlust kicked in when she roadtripped across Europe from her Parisian base aged four, and she's been hitting the road at every opportunity since, travelling to around 60 countries and completing her Doctorate of Creative Arts in Writing, Masters in Professional Writing, and postgrad qualifications in Editing and Publishing along the way. Over the past decade she's written dozens (and dozens) of Lonely Planet guidebooks covering Paris, France, Europe and far beyond. Her work has also appeared in numerous online and print publications including major newspapers and inflight magazines. Topping Catherine's list of travel tips is to travel without any expectations.
