Check out our newest offspring on amazon.com now. Get the 411 without the blah, blah, blah.

Hello all.  We’ve just updated all of our city-specific webpages with great info (and re-named them City Extras.)   You’ll find them through our main menu above.   This month they are especially pertinent to those traveling to our favorite places in May.  Also, brand new to our site is a page section called First Page Peeks for the Curious. This can also be accessed above, and allows potential readers to see the first main page of each of our travel ebooks, even the one for Florence that isn’t even out yet!  (Look for its publication in May.)

Enjoy Paris in springtime on an electric bike and take in some sights at the same time!

Wow, what a trip!  Our team just got back from Florence, Italy and all we can say is, Clued In Florence is going to be fantastic.  We gathered current info, took thousands of photos, met some incredible people, and cannot wait to share it all with you. This particular city guide will have everything today’s traveler needs to know– along with some surprises that we don’t want to give away just yet.  As usual, it will be completely different from other travel books on the market and will boast our expected “signature” of bringing you sights and restaurants you won’t read (or hear about) elsewhere.  We’re so excited!  Look for it to make its debut on Amazon.com sometime in May, 2018.  We will update this blog page with a more specific date once we have it. And a BIG thank you to all our blog-site visitors who’ve been contacting us about this new book.  Trust us, we’re writing as fast as we can!!

Once again the Clued In travel team is packing the suitcases and we could not be more excited!  Not only are we heading to one of our favorite countries, Italy, we are going there especially to finalize research and photography for our newest eBook, Clued In Florence!   Look for its debut in May.  We have long been wanting to give our readers the down-low on Florence and the time finally seemed right.  Honestly, if any city needs a Clued In travel guide it’s probably that one.  As complicated as Rome and Venice are, Florence is more-so and our upcoming guide will definitely give readers a leg-up on what to see there (and what not to waste precious time on.)  Arrivederci! See y’all on the other side of this trip.

~Dean & Andie, and the entire Clued In Travel Team

Debuting May 2018, only on Amazon!

Try Rome!  Of all of our featured Clued In European cities, it has the fairest weather and the least crowds. Having said that, we can’t promise there will be no rain at all, but storms hitting the Eternal City tend to blow past so fast that a quick duck into a pasticceria or café is usually all it takes to get past it.  We love Rome when it’s free from the the gazillions of tourists who descend on it during the summer months, and believe a city can best be explored in the off-season when you can easily breeze right into sights that in August would take you half a day to get in to. In addition, airfares and hotel rates are great.

Of course, it does matter precisely when in March one goes.  Many pilgrims visit Rome the week prior to Easter where special events at the Vatican are ongoing.  In 2018, the holiday falls on April 1st. For this reason, Holy Thursday and Good Friday (March 29th & 30th) will bring out the masses. On the other hand, if you don’t mind navigating the crowds you could have a very memorable experience attending mass at St. Peter’s Basilica during such a time. All are welcome; you certainly don’t have to be Catholic to attend (or admire) all the pomp and circumstance.

Also, the Rome Marathon –which is usually scheduled in late March– has been moved to April 7th for 2018, no doubt because of Easter falling on April 1st. It takes runners past most of the major sights- something you may want to be aware of.  But throughout most of March, Lenten processions are many and give visitors a taste of the local culture.  On the Ides of March (the 15th) commemoration of Julius Caesar’s death will be taking place by his statue near the Roman Forum. Out best advice is to make sure the timing of your visit matches up with your own interests.  As the temperatures can vary between 40 to 62 degrees, just be prepared to layer your clothing. 

Will the Clued In Travel team be there in March? you might ask…  We sure will.  We’ve got some research to do.  (But more on that later.)  See you there!

~The Clued In Travel Team

In addition to our main blog at cluedintravelbooks.com, we offer city-specific blogs as well! Be sure to check these out, especially if there’s a city our books cover that you will be visiting soon (or are already at!)  We say this because those other pages have very current, additional info beyond our ebooks that you will want to know about. The clickable menu (at the top and bottom of our blog site) list all seven cities.

The  January 2018 updates to each city blog have now been completed. These cover Pancake Day in London, costumed balls in Venice, a lesson on the pasta shapes found in Rome, Valentine’s Day happenings in Miami Beach, Valentine’s Day romance in Paris,  the Chinese New Year’s parade and festival in New York, and the immense annual pillow fight in San Francisco.

Evidently, travel writer’s job is never done.  It never fails; as soon as we finish the annual updates to our travel books, something gets changed in the world. (It seems this world never stops changing– especially in the Big Apple!)  But busy bees that we are here at Clued In Travel Books, we are on it.  Even so, we must admit that it can be disheartening.  Examples?  Okay…

When arriving with friends the other night at New Topaz Thai (which is one of our feasting recommendations in Clued In New York) our hearts sank when we saw that the restaurant had installed a new yellow awning over their doorway, with A CHANGE IN THEIR NAME!  Granted, it wasn’t a huge change but accuracy in our books is so important to us that it was difficult to bear.  What restaurant changes its name? Sheesh.  After our sublime meal -with some of the tastiest curry we’ve ever had anywhere- we rushed home to update the raw manuscript and to email Jason, our ebook formatter to make the change from New Topaz Thai to Topaz Thai Authentic.  This change will be reflected in Clued In New York books purchased after January 31st, 2018.  In addition, Topaz has now rented the space next door and is serving different dishes there under the name Topaz Noodle Bar.  It looks adorable and will be reviewed at our New York-specific blog page soon.

Our next frustration came when casually reading a recent article about New York’s famed Metropolitan Museum of Art (our #1 sight recommendation in Clued In New York.) It stated that after forty-plus years of allowing visitors to “pay what they want” for admission, they would soon be charging a mandatory fixed amount of $25 (except for folks with proof of local residency in NY.)  WHAT?!  Our hearts sank again.  Nevermind that the Met Museum was one of our top sight because it was a donation-based entry; nevermind that we committed about two and a half pages on the reasons why they were donation-based, and why visitors should not feel bad paying less than the suggested amount.  Did the Met Museum even think to speak with us first before making such a huge, historic change in their admission policy? Clearly not. Anyway, the one good thing is that visitors paying the full price will have a ticket that is good for entry for three days in a row.

And so once again we have to bother dear Jason and ask for a revision.  It never ends! But we are happy to have our blog site where, at the very least, we can announce any changes to info in our travel books quickly and efficiently, especially between our major annual updates.  If you own one of our books and are going on a trip soon, don’t forget to check the city-specific page – clickable on the top menu bar of cluedintravebooks.com –  so that you will be perfectly clued in on your trip!

Safe and happy travels!  ~Dean and Andie

A slight name change for Topaz Thai but the delicious cuisine is the same

It’s that holiday time again, and all of the great cities featured in our Clued In travel ebooks are in full celebration (and decoration) mode.  If you are planning a visit to Venice or Rome, Paris or London, New York, San Francisco, or even Miami Beach– we’ve got you covered.  The most frequent feedback from our traveler-readers? They find info in our books that they haven’t seen anywhere else!  Makes us very proud…

Check out each individual “city blog” from the menu above where we will be posting holiday greetings from each place.  And from our entire team, have a very merry Christmas and a New Year full of travel! 

The Nutcracker ballet at London’s Royal Opera House

All of us here at Clued In Travel Books would like to wish you and yours a very joyous, safe, and fun Thanksgiving holiday.  BTW, our author Andie Easton is a direct descendant of five of the pilgrims on the Mayflower!

The turkey balloon in New York’s Thanksgiving Day parade

Ice skating in Central Park

Hey, it’s great to see you here!  If this is your first visit to the Clued In Travel Books blog, click that welcome link on the green banner above. Our amazon.com links can be found on that same page too.

How to get around:   Aside from this general blog, we maintain city-specific blogs here too, and share special tips and recommendations for each and every one of our Clued In travel locations. You can visit these colorful webpages by clicking on the city names above. They contain our favorite photos too, and are a helpful addition to our current published travel guides.

This gorgeous photo of Rome’s Pantheon in the moonlight is by our photographer Richard Soto