Thinking about one final vacation before the kids start school and the leaves start falling? A travel guide would certainly help. With these highlights, you can quickly sift through the best travel books and bookstores. After all, you want to spend your time on vacation -- not planning it.

Of the numerous travel publishers, these are some of the biggest.

• Europe Through the Back Door
  Rick Steves, possibly the best-known authority on European travel, has written 21 guide books and been leading group tours for more than 20 years. His site also offers a wealth of free information, including travel tips and a monthly newsletter.
  
  
• Fodor's
  Create your own mini-guide for 99 worldwide destinations. Also search hotel, B&B and restaurant recommendations; research parks of North America; price airfares; and browse the Resource Center. (Interesting observation: No overt ads for their guide books -- and they publish hundreds.)
  
  
• Frommer's
  Research world destinations, then book your airfare and lodging -- all from one site. Also check out Arthur Frommer's Hot Spot of the Month and his Tip of the Day. Books include Frommer's Complete Guides and $-a-Day Guides, which are dubbed the only budget travel series for grown-ups.
  
  
  
  
  
• Let's Go Travel Guides
  One of the most popular guide series for the college and twentysomething set. Each of their 28 books, which cover cities, countries and continents, are revised annually. New books for 1999 cover Greece, South Africa and Turkey.
  
  
• Lonely Planet
  Publisher of more than 200 titles. Series includes Shoestring guides, walking and trekking guides, travel literature, and phrase books.
  
  
• Rough Guides
  These guys publish travel and music reference guides -- plus a few specialty titles like "A Rough Guide to the Year 2000" and the best-selling "Rough Guide to the Internet." Search thousands of destinations and read their online travel magazine.
  
  

• Adventurous Traveler Bookstore
  This store, based in Burlington, Vermont, boasts the world's most complete source of outdoor travel books, maps, videos, CD-ROMs and posters. Check out their rare and out-of-print collections.
  
  
• Traveler's Bookcase
  This Los Angeles-based travel bookstore carries travel guides and travel literature. They specialize in authors of obscure armchair literature and hard-to-find guide books.
  
  
• Wide World Books & Maps
  This Seattle-based store has the distinction of being the first travel-only bookstore in the U.S. They currently carry more than 14,000 map and book titles -- search their catalog by title, author, country or topic.
  
  
• 4DiscountTravelGuides
  The behemoth of the travel bookstore world -- they claim to have the largest selection of travel and geographically-categorized books, music and magazines on the Internet.