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Rick Steves Best of Spain
Hit Spain's can't-miss art, sights, and bites in two weeks or less with Rick Steves Best of Spain!
Strategic advice from Rick Steves on what's worth your time and money
Short itineraries covering Barcelona, Madrid, Toledo, Granada, Andalucía's White Hill Towns, and Sevilla
Rick's tips for beating the crowds, skipping lines, and avoiding tourist traps
The best of local culture, flavors, and haunts, including insightful walks through museums, historic sights, and atmospheric neighborhoods
Trip planning strategies like how to link destinations and design your itinerary, what to pack, where to stay, and how to get around
Over 400 full-color pages with detailed maps and vibrant photos throughout
Suggestions for side trips to Montserrat and Figueres, Basque Country, Santiago de Compostela, El Escorial, Segovia, Salamanca, Córdoba, and Spain's South Coast
Experience Spain's old world romance and new world excitement for yourself with Rick Steves Best of Spain!
Planning a longer trip? Rick Steves Spain 2020 is the classic, in-depth guide to exploring the country, updated annually.
Planning a longer trip? Rick Steves Spain 2020 is the classic, in-depth guide to exploring the country, updated annually.
993 pages, Kindle Edition
First published March 29, 2016
209 people are currently reading
59 people want to read
About the author
Rick Steves
571 books695 followersRick Steves is an American travel writer, television personality, and activist known for encouraging meaningful travel that emphasizes cultural immersion and thoughtful global citizenship. Born in California and raised in Edmonds, Washington, he began traveling in his teens, inspired by a family trip to Europe. After graduating from the University of Washington with a degree in European history and business, Steves started teaching travel classes, which led to his first guidebook, Europe Through the Back Door, self-published in 1980.
Steves built his Edmonds-based travel company on the idea that travelers should explore less-touristy areas and engage with local cultures. He gained national prominence as host and producer of Rick Steves' Europe, which has aired on public television since 2000. He also hosts a weekly public radio show, Travel with Rick Steves, and has authored dozens of popular guidebooks, including bestselling titles on Italy and Europe at large.
Beyond travel, Steves is an outspoken advocate for drug policy reform, environmental sustainability, and social justice. He supports marijuana legalization and chairs the board of NORML. He has funded housing for homeless families and donates to anti-hunger and arts organizations. In 2019, he pledged $1 million annually to offset the carbon emissions of his tour groups.
Steves is a practicing Lutheran with Norwegian ancestry and continues to live in Edmonds. He has two adult children and is in a relationship with Reverend Shelley Bryan Wee. Despite health challenges, including a prostate cancer diagnosis in 2024, Steves remains committed to his mission of helping Americans travel with greater purpose, empathy, and understanding of the world. His work reflects a belief that travel, done right, can be both transformative and a force for peace.
Steves built his Edmonds-based travel company on the idea that travelers should explore less-touristy areas and engage with local cultures. He gained national prominence as host and producer of Rick Steves' Europe, which has aired on public television since 2000. He also hosts a weekly public radio show, Travel with Rick Steves, and has authored dozens of popular guidebooks, including bestselling titles on Italy and Europe at large.
Beyond travel, Steves is an outspoken advocate for drug policy reform, environmental sustainability, and social justice. He supports marijuana legalization and chairs the board of NORML. He has funded housing for homeless families and donates to anti-hunger and arts organizations. In 2019, he pledged $1 million annually to offset the carbon emissions of his tour groups.
Steves is a practicing Lutheran with Norwegian ancestry and continues to live in Edmonds. He has two adult children and is in a relationship with Reverend Shelley Bryan Wee. Despite health challenges, including a prostate cancer diagnosis in 2024, Steves remains committed to his mission of helping Americans travel with greater purpose, empathy, and understanding of the world. His work reflects a belief that travel, done right, can be both transformative and a force for peace.
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Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews
April 10, 2025
The best traveling book series. Download his free podcasts for walking tours and other tourist sites.
The color-coded tab pages help to navigate through the thick volume. Each section covers the top places to experience as well as getting around, sleeping and eating. I like how he ranks sights by priority yet still goes into detail for each one. In the end, you decide on your trip.
Not a fan of Spain's customer care toward tourists so it's unlikely I will return when there are so may other European options.
MY GRADE: A minus.
The color-coded tab pages help to navigate through the thick volume. Each section covers the top places to experience as well as getting around, sleeping and eating. I like how he ranks sights by priority yet still goes into detail for each one. In the end, you decide on your trip.
Not a fan of Spain's customer care toward tourists so it's unlikely I will return when there are so may other European options.
MY GRADE: A minus.
May 13, 2016
As I knew less about Spain than Italy or France, I got this book the night before leaving for our 9 day trip to Spain because it wasn't that heavy and out of its 5 highlighted places, we were planning to visit 4 (Madrid, Toledo, Granada, Seville) and in addition it had good sections on Cordoba and Gibraltar which were the other two main places included in our plan; the book proved to be worth every penny since I carried it everywhere with me as it offered a great overview of the above places, visiting tips, self-guided trips to the most important attractions, excellent maps, even parking info for the places I wasn't set with the usual leave car at hotel, walk...(Cordoba and Gibraltar)
The Alhambra (stayed the full 6 hours allotted by the ticket), The Alcazar of Seville (Columbus and Game of Thrones!!), the Cathedral of Seville (and its grandeur), the Cathedral of Toledo (and its art works that rival lots of museums) and the city itself, the Museums of Madrid (including a good selection of the works from Prado and the Reino Sofia), the Royal Palace, the Plaza del Toros, good descriptions of both Gibraltar and Cordoba are all there and while i used some audio guides here and there, the book was invaluable for my explorations; also it pointed me to a few other museums (most notably the Naval Museum of Madrid and the Archaeological one which were both excellent - in addition the Natural Science Museum while smaller than say the NYC one has original collections from the 18th century that are just awesome with names like Linnaeus, Buffon, Lamarck...) as well to the food markets that are such an attraction and great place to eat as they offer so many choices (went to ones in Seville, Toledo, Madrid 2 of many, Cordoba)
Highly, highly recommended as a portable guide to the best of Spain
The Alhambra (stayed the full 6 hours allotted by the ticket), The Alcazar of Seville (Columbus and Game of Thrones!!), the Cathedral of Seville (and its grandeur), the Cathedral of Toledo (and its art works that rival lots of museums) and the city itself, the Museums of Madrid (including a good selection of the works from Prado and the Reino Sofia), the Royal Palace, the Plaza del Toros, good descriptions of both Gibraltar and Cordoba are all there and while i used some audio guides here and there, the book was invaluable for my explorations; also it pointed me to a few other museums (most notably the Naval Museum of Madrid and the Archaeological one which were both excellent - in addition the Natural Science Museum while smaller than say the NYC one has original collections from the 18th century that are just awesome with names like Linnaeus, Buffon, Lamarck...) as well to the food markets that are such an attraction and great place to eat as they offer so many choices (went to ones in Seville, Toledo, Madrid 2 of many, Cordoba)
Highly, highly recommended as a portable guide to the best of Spain
December 29, 2022
So helpful for traveling Spain! Could follow his recs to a T and they were pretty accurate! Also, when we didn't feel like paying for or standing through an entire tour of a monument, we read his book out loud while doing the walking tour, and it was excellent!
October 24, 2018
I can't say enough good things about this book. This was basically our bible when we went to Spain. I used it to plan our entire trip. I bought the Kindle edition, which was awesome, because I was able to load it to both my iPad for use at home/our hotel/on the plane and to my iPhone for use when we were out and about and needed information about something on the fly.
He hits all the major cities in Spain in this book. The only city that we visited that was not included in this book was Toledo, and we used another Rick Steves book that I borrowed from a friend to plan our day trip there.
The only thing we didn't utilize in the book was his hotel recommendations (although I will buy the book BEFORE we book our trip next time and use his hotel recommendations) and his restaurant recommendations, as it was just easier to wander into a random restaurant and order tapas than it was to seek out specific restaurants.
My only criticism is that the book says to buy tickets in advance only for some specific sights such as Alhambra, the Prado, etc. Our experience was that for anything that required tickets, always buy them in advance, and if there's a skip-the-line option, always spend the extra money for it, because time is money, and it will save you a ton of time you would otherwise spend standing in line! Spain was great, but there were SO MANY TOURISTS, that if we had to spend all our time in line waiting to get into sights, I know we would've enjoyed it less.
Also keep in mind that although the times things were open were pretty accurate, it's best to check the website of each sight before you go. One day we didn't get to go into a cathedral that we had hoped to see because it closed earlier than the book said it did.
Also keep in mind that while the prices he lists in the book are generally accurate, occasionally they're slightly off. For example, the book said audioguides for the Prado were 3.50 each--they were actually 6.00 each. So if you're on a super strict budget, that's something to keep in mind.
That said, this book was a lifesaver, and made trip planning a breeeze, so if you're thinking of going to Spain, buy this book!
He hits all the major cities in Spain in this book. The only city that we visited that was not included in this book was Toledo, and we used another Rick Steves book that I borrowed from a friend to plan our day trip there.
The only thing we didn't utilize in the book was his hotel recommendations (although I will buy the book BEFORE we book our trip next time and use his hotel recommendations) and his restaurant recommendations, as it was just easier to wander into a random restaurant and order tapas than it was to seek out specific restaurants.
My only criticism is that the book says to buy tickets in advance only for some specific sights such as Alhambra, the Prado, etc. Our experience was that for anything that required tickets, always buy them in advance, and if there's a skip-the-line option, always spend the extra money for it, because time is money, and it will save you a ton of time you would otherwise spend standing in line! Spain was great, but there were SO MANY TOURISTS, that if we had to spend all our time in line waiting to get into sights, I know we would've enjoyed it less.
Also keep in mind that although the times things were open were pretty accurate, it's best to check the website of each sight before you go. One day we didn't get to go into a cathedral that we had hoped to see because it closed earlier than the book said it did.
Also keep in mind that while the prices he lists in the book are generally accurate, occasionally they're slightly off. For example, the book said audioguides for the Prado were 3.50 each--they were actually 6.00 each. So if you're on a super strict budget, that's something to keep in mind.
That said, this book was a lifesaver, and made trip planning a breeeze, so if you're thinking of going to Spain, buy this book!
July 3, 2024
I read this cover to cover so it counts as a read book!
March 23, 2018
I looked at other travel books about Spain, but defaulted to the comfort of the Rick Steves format and content. We went only to Granada and to Barcelona and it was still worth buying this book. His information is practical, especially about "must-see" places. For instance, I bought the tickets for the Alhambra before I even reserved our tickets to Granada because Rick recommends booking them ASAP. Friends, there at the same time, were unable to get into the Nasrid Palaces because they waited too long to get tickets. We also had the tickets we wanted when we went to La Familia Sagrada in Barcelona following the advice in this book. We often don't follow his recommendations on restaurants and hotels but do look carefully about locations, transportation and ways to explore a city's "back doors".
October 25, 2016
Good; I thought better than just Rick Steves Spain 2015. This one is in color and hits the highlights. On to find a book just on Madrid...
December 29, 2025
Spain in the spring! Getting all the details for the cities, towns and sights that I will be visiting. Steves always does a great job with his guidebooks. I especially recommend the included walking tours. Great assistance for the independent traveler.
February 2, 2025
Read while planning a trip for friends to Barcelona and Sevilla. A great overview as usual. Now I want to plan my own trip!
June 6, 2019
Perfect guide.
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews