How We Research

Why this page exists

Most travel content online repeats the same handful of secondary summaries without ever telling you where the figures came from. We take the opposite approach: every guide we publish carries a byline, links back to this page, and rests on sources we are willing to name. If you have ever wondered whether an opening time or admission price on a travel site is current — or simply invented — this page explains exactly how we arrive at ours and what we do when we are not sure.

Our editorial process is led by Daniel Okonkwo, Founder & Travel Editor, with research carried out by our editorial team and, in cities where we have one, a named local contributor.

The source hierarchy we follow

Not all sources deserve equal weight. We rank them, and we work down the list rather than reaching for whatever ranks first in a search engine:

1. Primary operator data — the venue, museum, or transit authority itself. An attraction's own ticketing page is the authoritative source for its current price and hours; a metro operator's site is authoritative for fares and routes. This is where we start for anything that changes often.
2. Official tourism and government bodies — national and regional tourism boards, ministries of culture, and statistical offices for entry requirements, regional context, and demographic or geographic figures.
3. Heritage and academic records — UNESCO nomination dossiers for inscribed sites, museum collection catalogues, and peer-reviewed or institutional histories for cultural and historical context.
4. On-the-ground observation — first-hand notes from our editorial team and local contributors on routes, timings, queues, and the practical detail that official pages omit. We treat this as evidence to be cross-checked, never as a substitute for verifiable data.

Encyclopaedic aggregators and other travel sites are useful for orientation, but we do not treat them as authoritative. Where they are our only lead, we trace the claim back to a primary source before we publish it.

Verifying prices, hours, and figures

Concrete numbers are the most useful — and the most perishable — part of any guide. When we state an admission price, an opening time, a journey duration, or a distance, we check it against the operator's own current information rather than copying it from another guide. When a figure cannot be confirmed against a primary source, we say so plainly instead of presenting an estimate as fact.

We never rely on a single source for a contested detail. Conflicting information is flagged and resolved through additional research, and where genuine ambiguity remains — a seasonal closure, a price that varies by nationality or age — we describe the variation rather than flatten it into a single misleading number.

Sourcing and citations on factual claims

Factual claims about history, geography, and culture are attributed to the body that records them — the institution that holds a collection, the heritage authority that inscribed a site, or the official source for a statistic. We prefer to name that source in the text where it adds credibility and context, rather than burying provenance in a footnote no reader will open.

When sources disagree on a historical detail, we present the consensus position and note the dispute rather than picking a side silently. The goal is that a careful reader could, in principle, retrace any factual claim we make to the record it came from.

Our policy on imagery

Photography on Tour Guide is held to the same honesty standard as our text. Our preference, in order, is for original or commissioned imagery that shows a place as it actually is; then for clearly attributed, properly licensed images from reputable sources; and only where neither is available, for representative illustrative imagery that is never passed off as something it is not.

• Original and illustrative over generic stock — a real photograph of the wharf, square, or façade a guide describes is always preferred to an interchangeable stock image that could depict anywhere.
• Attribution and licensing — every third-party image we use is properly licensed and credited to its source and author, and we host images ourselves rather than hot-linking them.
• No misleading imagery — we do not use a photograph of one place to stand in for another, and we do not present illustrative or AI-assisted imagery as documentary evidence of a specific scene.
• Accessibility — every image carries descriptive alt text so the page is usable with a screen reader and legible to search engines.

Authorship and accountability

Every destination page names who stands behind it. Most pages carry our editorial byline; in cities where we have a dedicated local contributor, that named contributor bylines the page and is presented consistently wherever their work appears. Bylines are never anonymous filler — each one links back to a profile so you know whose judgement you are reading.

We are independent. Tour Guide is not a booking aggregator chasing commissions, and a recommendation is never sold. When we recommend a local guide, we apply the credential and vetting standards described on our about page, and our judgement is our own.

Corrections and updates

Travel facts have a shelf life: prices rise, museums close for restoration, and access rules shift. Every page carries a last updated date that reflects its most recent substantive review, so you always know how current the information is. We review high-change pages on a rolling schedule and revise the date whenever we change a fact.

If you spot something wrong — an outdated price, a changed opening time, a factual slip — tell us at [email protected] and we will investigate promptly. Corrections from readers who know a place well are one of the most valuable inputs we have.