Los Angeles, San Diego & Southern California

First awestruck by the neon lights of the Strip during a cross-country US road trip, Sara Benson now travels clown to the desert every chance she gets She has racked up more hours gambling, carousing and exploring the underbelly of Las Vegas than she'll ever admit to her grandmother. Many a lost weekend has been spent bar-hopping on the Strip, chowing down in Chinatown and playing poker until the wee hours in downtown's Glitter Gulch.
The author of more than 55 travel and nonfiction books, Sara also writes for many popular travel websites, magazines and newspapers at home and abroad. She's an avid hiker, backpacker and all-seasons outdoor enthusiast. Andy Bender is a true Angeleno, not because he was born in Los Angeles but because he's made it his own. This native New Englander drove cross-country to work in film production, and eventually realized that the joy was in the journey (and writing about it).
He writes the Seat 1A travel site for Forbes, and his writing has also appeared in the Los Angeles Times, in-flight magazines and over three dozen Lonely Planet titles. Current obsessions : discovering SoCal's next great ethnic enclave and photographing winter sunsets over the Pacific. Andrew also wrote the Disneyland Trip Planner chapter. Adam Skolnick has written about travel, culture, health, sports, human rights and the environment for Lonely Planet, New York Times, Outside, Men's Health, Travel & Leisure, Salon.com, BBC.com and ESPN.com.
He has authored or co-authored 26 Lonely Planet guidebooks.