Tourists, get ready for a great day in Vancouver! Grab your guidebook and visit Storyeum, "Gastown's newest attraction". Lunch on barbecue ribs at Carlos 'N Bud's Tex-Mex Saloon. Head over to West 4th Avenue to browse the books at Women in Print, "one of the leading places to come to find out about women-centred events in Vancouver". Cap the night off at DV8, one of the city's "Top 5 clubs".

As locals know, these places are ancient history. But tourists believe what they read, and all of these establishments are listed in the most recent, third edition of Lonely Planet's Vancouver City Guide (April 2005). So don't be surprised to see a gaggle of fanny-packers pacing Gastown in vain, looking for Storyeum and muttering, "But it says in the guidebook…"

We don't mean to single out Lonely Planet, as its Vancouver guide contains much current information and other publications boast similarly out-of-date listings. The point is that what's obvious to us in our own city we often forget when travelling to an unfamiliar town: things change. We often view travel guidebooks as bibles and blindly follow what they say. But they're not gospel; they are merely guides .

The nature of print publishing means that something will have changed from the time a travel book is researched to when it hits the shelves. According to Lonely Planet's Web site ( www.lonelyplanet.com/ ), its guidebooks are updated on two-, three-, or four-year cycles. "For the larger guides…the process of commissioning, researching, writing, and editing takes about eight months. For smaller guides the process can take around four months."

Using this math, the Vancouver guidebook would have been researched around the end of 2004–which is why Storyeum, which opened in June 2004, is listed as a new attraction. (It went bankrupt in October 2006.)

Publishers update at different rates, so edition date is something to consider when selecting a guidebook. For example, according to Frommer's Web site ( www.frommers.com/ ), "Frommer's guides with the year in the title (i.e., Frommer's Italy 2005 ) are published every year. Frommer's guides with an edition number (i.e., Frommer's Virgin Islands, 6th edition ) are published every two years." Let's Go updates its "most popular titles annually, and many of our other guides biannually", according to L etsgo.com .

Most publishers acknowledge in fine print that their books aren't exactly up-to-the-minute. "Things change," says the Rough Guide to Vancouver (third edition, April 2007), which, by the way, also lists Storyeum. "Opening hours are notoriously fickle, restaurants and rooms raise prices or lower standards."

Expect this, and deal with it pro­actively. Some publishers have updates on their Web site, although these can be cursory. Reader forums provide more current, but unverified, information. Visit an official tourist-information centre at your destination, and load up on its brochures and publications, which are more likely to be current. Check local newspapers for entertainment and restaurant listings. Call ahead to verify guidebook information.

Above all, accept that prices go up and that things may not be exactly as detailed. And if the Storyeums of the world no longer exist, you'll stumble on your own, more interesting discoveries anyway.