Lonely Planet Madrid (Travel Guide)

This book helped us prioritize what to see, eat, and do for a long weekend in Madrid.

Purchased for an upcoming trip to Madrid. I stick with the Lonely Planet series for most of my travel. Having completed around 75 percent of this book, I have found a good overview, good descriptions of places, restaurants and things to do, and even a section on surrounding places to visit. I would have liked a larger map since the maps provided only cover a small part of the downtown and don’t include the hotel I am staying in, for example, or many places of interest mentioned in the book. It would also have been useful to have a complete map of the metro system.

The book speaks for itself.

I normally like Lonely Planet and they tend to be my go-to guide book. This had the bonus of being updated for publication May 2022. I was disappointed in the level of update. I understand there will have been restrictions in how much could be done, but this was out of date in comparison to a friend's guidebook updated in 2021. For example Palacio Real entry is stated as €10 when it's €13 (2021 guidebook correct), highly recommended tapas bar on Calle Baja is now a cocktail bar.There was only one walking route suggested, the old town. It would have been good to have more like this - you're in an area of the city here are some suggested routes and sights for all or most areas. Madrid lends itself to walking within areas and it can be done without a plan, but a planned route can help not miss things.The index wasn't comprehensive, there were several occasions when I looked for something and it wasn't there so had to go back to the main body of the book to search.On this occasion I found my friend's guide book (DK I think) to be better organised and more up to date.