Путешествие - Travelling. Руденко Т.П. - 16 стр.

                         Guide to the Planet                                    like they once did. ‘I don’t want to spend all night on a train in India. I’ve
                                                                                been there and done that, I don’t need to keep doing it’.
It all began with their account of a van journey to Australia in 1972. Now
there are Lonely Planet guidebooks to some 200 destinations worldwide,
and founders Tony and Maureen Wheeler are multi-millionaires.                    5       So what do they think about travel in general? ‘My children have
                                                                                travelled all over the world so they’re aware of a lot of things,’ says Mau-
 0 Tony Wheeler is the man behind the Lonely Planet guidebooks, books           reen and Tony agrees. ‘It helps you grow up a lot, just knowing how other
which are loved and hated in equal measure. It’s hard to pin down why they      people live and what happens in their countries. Secondly, being on your
provoke such violent emotion; once it was simply because they lied - you’d      own, having to make your way from one place to the next and work out
turn up for the weekly Wednesday ferry to find that actually it goes on         how you do that, gives you a self-sufficiency that I think is very important.’
Tuesdays. Nowadays they are carefully researched, the information is gen-
erally true, and the maps are accurate.                                          6      There has been controversy surrounding the guidebooks. There are
                                                                                the people who say that by encouraging people to go places they are de-
 1    No, it’s something about the way they take you over – you become a        stroying them – an accusation they both deny, claiming that people would
slave to the guidebook. Arrive in a place and out comes the book: Places to     go there anyway. They admit that none of this is bad for business. ‘All the
Stay, Things to See, Getting Around, Places to Eat – all of which is unde-      publicity has sold our books.’
niably useful, but you end up living a life dictated by Weeler, and that life
might not be right for you. On top of that, everyone else has got one too, so
                                                                                 7     After lunch, Maureen is flying back to Australia to do a bit of busi-
instead of being the independent traveller you thought you were, you end
                                                                                ness and Tony is off for a bit of travelling. He’s bought himself maps,
up being just another tourist.
                                                                                guidebooks, a new one-man tent, and he’s going to walk across Corsica, on
                                                                                his own.
 2 It’s not entirely fair to blame only Tony. His wife Maureen, who runs
the company with him, is equally to blame. It all started in 1972 when,
                                                                                In small groups share your point of view on guidebooks like The Lonely
bored with Britain, they set off for Australia. They arrived in Sydney three
                                                                                Planet. Have you ever read any guidebook? If yes, why? Do you believe
months later with 27 cents between them. Tony sold his camera, then sat
                                                                                such guidebooks are of any help? Would you like to have one at hand
down and wrote about the trip. They put the pages together and took it
                                                                                while travelling?
around the local bookshops and one of the bookshops sold thousands of
copies.
                                                                                SPEAKING THROUGH READING
 3 Twenty-five years on, Lonely Planet, has quite literally, taken over the     1. Do you prefer going on holidays to relax or do you like to take part in
world. Their 200-odd guidebooks cover nearly everywhere and there are              sports or other activities? Or maybe you are attracted by the idea of
phrasebooks, atlases, walking guides. They sell more than three million            adventure vacations? With a partner, discuss the activity holidays be-
books a year and employ around 200 people. The Lonely Planet website is            low and say whether you would enjoy them or not.
visited a million times a day and the Wheelers have replaced the van with a
red Ferrari.                                                                    • (a mountain -) climbing trip            • picking grapes
                                                                                • studying a foreign language             • (a) white-water rafting (trip)
 4 I met them for lunch. Tony, now 52, is small with glasses – more like        • scuba diving                            • helping on an archaeological site
a geography teacher than a traveller. Maureen admits they don’t rough it        • working as an au pair                   • working as a lifeguard

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