I was pretty harsh on Schultz's previous international edition of this book. So I am going to be a little nicer here and admit that the book is fun to read through and does let readers know about some great places to visit that they might otherwise have never heard of.

But the fact remains that Patricia Schultz is who she is, a snobby writer for Conde Nast Traveler magazine who has an intense obsession with fancy hotels, restaurants, spas and resorts that are out of the price range of most travellers. I also agree with the previous reviewer that the more you enclose yourself within the gated confines of luxury the less of an authentic travel experience you are likely to have.

I was especially upset by Schultz's international edition because it reinforced the notion, that too many Americans already have, that global travel is only possible for wealthy jetsetters. Instead the truth is that travel on a budget is available to everyone. And, in fact, many backpackers manage to spend a year or more travelling around places like Latin American and Southeast Asia for less then the costs of paying rent and bills at home. Of course, the declining U.S. dollar is making this harder to do now, but that's a whole other story.

I see Schultz's fascination with the lifestyles of the wealthy and fabulous to be slighty less problematic in this book because Americans and Canadians are generally more aware of domestic buget travel options as compared to travelling abroad. Still I think if Schultz focused a little less attention on the Hamptons and Palm Beach, on $700 hotels and $300 restaurants, then she might have been able to write a book that is more useful to the ordinary traveller.

1,000 places to go before I die? More like 1,000 spas and resorts and resturants. Big deal - the more money you spend, the bigger the wall you create between yourself and the local culture. Who wants to know about exotic resorts and five star restaurants? Don't tell me about the big ticket items! Tell me about quirky offbeat places with personality and charm, things I cant get anywhere else. Tell me about Hole in the Rock, UT. Tell me about The Last Stoplight on I-90. Tell me about a PLACE, not about how to spend money at generic locations.

Worthless.

I have an 'undying' love for some of the places listed in this tome... and have a greater appreciation of the diversity and complexity of America to the South. I was hoping to see more similar places and people listed for Canada... but perhaps that is too much to expect from an American Publication. With todays Gasoline prices, reading about those American destinations and searching for them on the Internet is perhaps the only travel my family and I are likely to launch into.

This book is great, but it is missing some key places to visit or see before you die. There are others places that do not validate why I should visit them. This book is a great guide, but do not use it as a "be all" bible type book.

If she had, she never would've lumped the Henry Ford Museum and Greenfield Village into a category labeled AUTO MUSEUMS. It deserves a full, explanatory entry. Ms. Schultz is probably unaware that Henry Ford purchased and moved buildings such as the Wright Brothers' bicycle shop, Thomas Edison's Menlo Park laboratory, Stephen Foster's house, Noah Webster's house, and so many more to Dearborn, Michigan. Lincoln's Illinois courthouse used to feature his chair from the Ford Theater (it has been moved into the Henry Ford museum). The Henry Ford museum does offer an incredible collection of automobiles but also so much more. I definately would've made different choices than Ms. Schultz. In this book and in her 1,000 Places to See in the World, she gives Shelburne Farm in Vermont a full entry. Shelburne Farm is a nice, living history museum but it does not compare to Greenfield Village. Now I wonder if her other recommendations are worthwhile. I have both books. I understand some places would get missed, but I definately would've make many different choices.

My husband and I are planning a trip through the southwest this summer and found this to be very helpful in planning our trip. Also, learned of a few places we did not know about, that are close to home. Anyone who likes to travel should buy this book.

This was a great addition to our library. Now that our children are old enough to enjoy and get something out of vacations, we will be using this more often. It's a great way to have the kids help choose the next destination-adventure.

I tend to be very cautious about traveling in the US especially when I heard that California is in the top 15 most dangerous states in the US but this book helps me pinpoint where I want to go. I feel that if it's in the book, it must be safe enough to visit.

This book has some great ideas for planning vacations or looking for things to do in a place you are already planning to visit. Lots of fun!

I received the "1,000 Places to See Before You Die" book for a gift and bought this one as a whim. I am very glad I did there is a lot of amazing sites in North America that I was unaware of and now I can not wait to go explore them. I have already planned to visit a few of the places mentioned. The book has good, through information on each site and offers places that appeal to all travelers. It is definitely an awesome book to have if you love to travel.

Based on the places we have been, including where we live in Bartlesville, OK, we found this book to be basically accurate as well as entertaining and therefore informative in helping us plan future trips and "places to see." Any work like this cannot be all-inclusive but we did question the omission of a few places we know that would seem major candidates for inclusion. A fun read whether or not you ever leave home...

I really liked this book. I have travelled extensively, and this has been a great resource for pointing out some of the lesser-known attractions that you might otherwise miss. I have found a great application to be to pick three or four obvious things that we want to see (e.g., this summer: Yellowstone, Teton, Glacier national parks) and use the book to fill in what we should see on the way from and back to Denver. This book suggested several stops in Idaho and Wyoming that we would have missed that are essentially on the way. I think that most people who travel will find this to be a practical and fun to read resource.

My mother opened this for Christmas day and she loved it. I have the other version (the world) and I absolutely love it. It is really interesting to read about places and try to visit them. I think this is a great book for a traveler or even a person who enjoys gathering information about interesting places. A very good book!

At first, I thought it wouldn't arrive on time since I got free shipping and it was very close to Thanksgiving. To my surprise, it arrived on time and was packed very well.

This book is just awesome. I'm a travel and map freak so this book which has 1000 mini travel articles is right up my alley. I will spend weeks looking at this and plan to use it every time I travel somewhere to plan my route. Some places are well known and some are obscure but every place looks interesting.

This is an excellent book for people who enjoy exploring cities and wonderful places in the US and Canada. So much out there to see, places to visit... and this book gives you lots of important details making it easier for planning a trip.

Cool idea. Quite fun to use actually. The only thing is that anyone can find the cool tourist things to do in any given place online. I just wish it had more off the beaten path places in it.

This is a great book. Lots of fun to browse and plan trips for the next 100 years or so! A couple of minor complaints, though. I live in Grand Teton National Park and went to check it out. Much to my surprise, one of the other major mountains (Mt. Moran) is identified as the Grand Teton. Worse yet, the same photo of Mt. Moran is identified as Denali. So enjoy the book for planning and fun but not mountain identification.

This book was purchased as a gift for my husband. We enjoy traveling and I thought this book would be a big help in going to places we hadn't thought about and making the plans to go to wherever. I will be retiring next year and then we can go & see the wonderful places in this great country of ours.

My family and I have been on over 20 U.S. Road Trips, to 48 states.
This book is a must. It is a great resource for finding something
special to do in every U.S. state. Very well summarized, and easy
to read.The Complete Guide to the Ultimate Family Road Trip

Some of the descriptions are a little vague - but hey - there's a 1,000 of them.

It you like to travel or find yourself on a road trip, then toss this book in the car or suitcase. It will take you places others have missed.

It's fun to start checking off the places you've already been and making a list of destinations you want to visit.

You don't need a big budget for these 1,000 places. I'll bet many of them are within a long week-end from your home and are free.

This is a fun coffee table book. As you flip though it, it'll make you want to take a trip somewhere.

I wish this book was in my glove box on my 50-state road trip, when trying to figure out, on my own, what to see in each new state.

It's not the type of book you actually sit down and READ, but rather something you glance through lazily when dreaming up future travel plans, or when wondering what to do in your own state when you have an open weekend and don't know what to do with it. In other words, it's a good travel reference tool.

Yes, some reviewers warned that one can find all this stuff on the web, but this book is a good starting place to begin more in-depth research online. Plus, there's something nice about curling up in an easy chair with a cuppa tea, a highlighter and a book of ideas to inspire.

One thing I've used it for over and over again, is to substantiate recommendations I make. Simply adding, "It's in the book, 1000 PLACES TO SEE BEFORE YOU DIE, makes the person I'm talking to suddenly value my recommendation. Try this experiment sometime: Recommend a place to someone. Pause and watch the expression on his or her face. Then add, "It's in the book, 1000 PLACES TO SEE BEFORE YOU DIE," and watch the expression change to excitement and eagerness.

There is little I can add to what's already been written about this book except to say that I wish I had it in my glove box on my 50-state road trip, when I'd land in a new state and try to figure it out on my own.

It's not the type of book you actually sit down and READ, but rather something you glance through lazily when dreaming up future travel plans, or when wondering what to do in your own state when you have an open weekend and don't know what to do with it. In other words, it's a good travel reference tool.

Yes, some reviewers warned that one can find all this stuff on the web, but this book is a good starting place to begin more in-depth research online. Plus, there's something nice about curling up in an easy chair with a cuppa tea, a highlighter and a book of ideas to inspire.

One thing I've used it for over and over again, is to substantiate recommendations I make. Simply adding, "It's in the book, 1000 PLACES TO SEE BEFORE YOU DIE, makes the person I'm talking to suddenly value my recommendation. Try this experiment sometime: Recommend a place to someone. Pause and watch the expression on his or her face. Then add, "It's in the book, 1000 PLACES TO SEE BEFORE YOU DIE," and watch the expression change to excitement and eagerness.

I read all the reviews after I had ordered the book so it was with some trepidation that I sat down to page through it. 4 hours later I was tempted to grab my car keys and head out the door on the road trip of a lifetime. Even if you aren't planning a road trip this book will leave you pondering how you can work one into your year.

Let me get my chief complaints out of the way first: this author loves to eat. It sometimes seems that every other entry is a restaurant or local culinary hot-spot, from "Cheese Country" to "Big Pig Jig." These are not destinations, they're cuisines. Subtract those, and you probably have a book better titled 900 Places to See Before You Die. (Assuming all the eating doesn't kill you at number 600.)

Another minor quibble: some of the "places" are actually events, like Burning Man and the Indianapolis 500. I'll overlook it...

She also likes to go in style, and apparently hasn't met a spa she didn't like. Subtract all the ultra-ritzy exclusive hotel/spas, sculpture gardens, resorts, dude ranches and expensive art galleries, which are likely either of out reach financially or simply not of interest to a large base of the potential audience, and you're down to 500 Places to See.

So, then, if you can get it for half price, you've got a bargain.

Now, onto the good things. There are many, despite my protestations above. First is the very idea of the book. It's fun and interesting to see such a list compiled; invariably something important gets left out, but what is created by the greater-than-the-sum-of-its-parts compilation is a true sense of America as a destination in its own right, worth of as much attention as any other in the world.

Also, I was made aware of many places I wouldn't have found otherwise, like the Yoder Popcorn Shoppe in Topeka, Indiana. There are many hidden treasures in these pages.

Finally, despite being top-heavy with attractions for the chic looky-loo set as mentioned above, the book is saved from being completely out of touch by its inclusion of attractions that appeal to a broad section of people (as would befit a book about America). Burning Man Festival is here, as is the State Fair of Texas, the Civil Rights Trail, and others.

My strong recommendation is that a second book be created called "1000 Places to Dine Before You Die," (though the publisher may not want to have the words "dine" and "die" so close together), and all the restaurant entries removed from this and placed there. Then the gap filled with what got left out of this book and should have been in in the first place.

This is the book you buy and never read. A must-have, but not worth a read...

I have to travel a lot for business purposes, this book helps me and my wife make plans to enjoy our time off together. A little business and a little pleasure! We enjoy new adventures and this book makes finding those adventures a little easier.

Billy Wannyn

I have to travel a lot for business purposes, this book helps me and my wife make plans to enjoy our time off together. A little business and a little pleasure! We enjoy new adventures and this book makes finding those adventures a little easier.



Billy Wannyn

This book is fine but all the information provided can be found easily online. I would have enjoyed it more had they interviewed locals during the research stage, and found locations that I couldn't just find on the internet.

This book says it all about places to visit and things to do. Great detail. Not much on 'outdoorsy' kinds of activities, but plenty on museums, rides, historical events/places, etc. Definitely worth the money!

My co-workers and I are going through here to see how many places we have been collectively. It is a very helpful tool and on target!

Good but not as good as expected. Seem to emphasize certain personal preferences and concentrated on the same types of places instead of a more rounded approach.

This book is just what I needed. It is a great reference book for planning my travel experiences.

This is a great book for people who think they have travelled alot. I was amazed at the interesting things I have missed in my travels. Wish I had this book for years. It really tells out of the way places I wish I had been to.

If you love to travel then this book is definitely for you. I retired recently and have been doing a little traveling but mostly to nearby areas. But after checking out this book I took out my Road Atlas and started mapping plans for longer and better trips. A fine addition to a traveling persons library.

This could be cut down to the top 100 or 250. 1000 is too much!

Good as a primer to consider new places to travel but most locations will be upper end monies ($$$-$$$$)

The positive reviews were very misleading. If you have ever used a travel book before, you will be disappointed by the lack of information supplied in this book. San Diego has 2 pages, San Francisco has 7 1/2 pages and Santa Fe has 3 1/2 pages(I guess Santa Fe did better than San Diego) and the Pueblo's of New Mexico have 1 page. I agree that the hotels reviewed were some of the most expensive and there were very few covered.

I got this book hoping for new inspirations on places to take my family. While some of the eastern and midwestern states were quite a bit more comprehensive with interesting locations, the two places which I was interested in California and Western Canada were a big disappointment. Most of the California locations were vaguely defined and would have been known to anyone who had never been there. The western Canada sites were fabulously expensive and only accessible to the privileged few who can spend between 300 and 1000 a night on exotic hotels and expensive restaurants. This tendency to list only the generic and the ridiculously expensive in some locations makes this book useless to me.

I purchased this book for my father, who is newly retired. While visiting him the other day, I glanced through the book to see check marks listed beside places that he has been. Not only that....my mom and dad have a trip planned to the Western U.S. and have used this book as a planning guide. My dad is so excited that he will be able to check off 4 more places after the trip!

Like many readers, I had the same reaction to the original "1,000 Places to See Before You Die." I'm not sure I'll ever get to South America or Central Africa and was looking more for interesting things around where I live. For example, in my home state of Iowa, there was only one item in the original book, which was definitely undervaluing the hub of America's heartland.

The new book has a wealth of interesting, unique and special places in the U.S. and Canada that I can now access on my next road-trip.

This is a great read and a good value.

I know there are so many places to see in the US and Canada, but this book really didn't do many places justice.

Just to name a couple....according to the book there is nothing to see in Florida north of Tampa. Have you never been to Pensacola? Seen McGuire's Restaurant, the Vietnam Memorial, The Air Museum. How about Flora-bama on the Florida-Alabama line. How about southern Illinois, have you ever been to Garden of the Gods? Shawnee National Forest, stayed at the lockmaster quarters on the Mississippi in Glocanda?

I realize, there are a thousand places to see in each state, but how many people can afford a trip to Charlie Trotter's in Chicago?

Just my opinion....

This is a fun book. The reader can build vacations around it. The work is based on the philosophy that (page x):

". . .travel has always been based on removing myself from what is comfortable and safe, on seeking out experiences that broaden my horizons and enrich me in ways superficial and profound."

The author also notes that she (page xiii) ". . .discovered time and again the country that is my home."

I'm from Illinois originally, so I immediately looked at the sites in the Prairie State. Many of these make a great deal of sense. Of course, one can always ask questions like: If Nauvoo, why not Bishop Hill? Still, good selections from my home state.

I lived in New York for quite awhile. I love the inclusion of the Anchor Bar (home of "Buffalo chicken wings"). I enjoyed the weekend jazz music and the wings. This is where Buffalo chicken wings began. The inevitable question: Why not the Genesee River Gorge? Once more, no criticism of the author's choices--just that there are a lot of possibilities that don't show up in the book.

Now, I live in Pennsylvania. And while I can understand the places included in this book, I also wonder why the exquisite Capitol Building of the Commonwealth in Harrisburg is not listed.

However, that is part of the charm of such books. Engaging in a dialogue with the authors' choices.

All in all, a very nice work and a good read.

So many kids think there is nothing to see in the United States, that it is all out of the Country. There is a lot to see all over the world However, this book shows you what there is to see here in the US and Canada. My husban and I have already looked at things we would like to go see together and my boys ages 17 and 19 have looked through it and found some stuff they never knew was there to see. I will be getting them each their own copy so that they can mark off what they have seen as they go along.

I just got this book and I love it. I always had wanted the 1000 Places to See Before You Die (world edition) but decided against it b/c I felt that I would never have the opportunity to use the majority of the book.

When the US & Canada Edition came out, I was so excited. There are so many places you can enjoy in your home state or drive a couple of hours and see many places you never even heard of!! The book has major landmarks and well as less known sites ....in addition, it also has restaurants, hotels, shops, golf courses. I would definitely recommend this book for people of all ages...I am in my early 20s and can't wait to see some of these places throughout the US and Canada. It is a great gift...if you don't know what to get someone. Even if you can't travel frequently...it's a great source to read and learn more about our country.

In addition, I used the Amazon standard shipping!! I couldn't believe how fast I got the book....I ordered it Tuesday afternoon and it was already here by Thursday morning!!

If your dream is to travel throughout our wonderful country, this book will certainly help you fulfill that dream. As principal of a financial planning and wealth management firm and author of Securing a Retirement Income for Life, an important part of my service is to help our clients achieve their dream of financial independence. Achieving financial independence is about more than money. It is about freedom. It is about having the time to do what you want, when you want, where you want - with the people you enjoy the most.

I recommend 1,000 Places To See Before You Die to all of my clients who enjoy traveling. In fact, I give a copy to all of my newly retired clients who love to travel. Countless options abound. There are so many spectacular sights and unforgettable places to see for the active and adventurous, for children and adults alike. In addition to being comprehensive, this book is also very easy to read. Travel is a true reward for those who have been successful at planning for their future. Don't wait another day. Start dreaming. Start planning.

Ms. Schultz has done it again - the first volume was not only equalled but surpassed - the hidden treasures in our country are waiting to be discovered and I plan to visit as many as I can. Her descriptions are inviting, exciting and enticing... Colorado is perfectly highlighted, and gems uncovered in nearly every imaginable place. Everyone should dog-ear their copies and see the good old USA. already looking forward to her next 1,000 Places!!!!

I asked for (and received) this book for my birthday. I am so glad I did!
I have traveled a lot in the US and am working on seeing the rest of the world, but wanted to know what I was missing here in the US. I anxiously flipped through the book and made a note next to each place I had visited.
I was amazed and impressed to find locations just a few miles from my home that I had never seen. I'll be visiting soon.
I am sure I will think of a couple of places that (I think) should have been included. Overall, though, this book is very comprehensive. It is fun and easy to read.
Nice touches inside include web links, phone numbers, etc. for each of the places. I also like the way the book is indexed in the back: active travel and adventure, culinary experiences, glorious nature, great golf, scenic drives, take the kids, etc. This makes it easy to search for a particular type of site, even if you don't know exactly what part of the country you want to see.

I loved Schultz' first book, "1,000 Places to See Before You Die" which covered the world! But, since I've traveled much more extensively in the US, I was eager to compare experiences. She 'nails' it everytime. I love the fact that this book includes festivals, art shows, restaurants, spas and yes, golf courses! All the sites of natural beauty(the Grand Tetons are my favorite)and history(Gettysburg is a must see)as well as the seemingly sacred sites of Birmingham and the Civil Rights trail...I began to think this book belongs in our schools for the kids to get a sense of the magic of our county. Brava, Ms. Schultz!

Love this book, also have 1,000 Places to See Before You Die. Purchased fast, shipped fast, received fast. Love the book.