Trips are always more fun if you know somebody on the ground. Guidebooks are great for reading up on culture and history but if you want to get under the skin of a destination – and find the hottest bars, shops and restaurants – you need a savvy local to show you around, writes Mark Hodson, editor of 101 Holidays

A number of websites offer to do this, providing detailed up-to-date guides created by enthusiastic locals. There is no better way to get off the regular tourist trail. Here’s our guide to some of the best.

Spotted by Locals offers up-to-date travel tips to visitors of 20 cities across Europe, from Amsterdam to Zagreb. In each destination the site’s founders have personally recruited a team of local or expat “Spotters” who recommend restaurants, bars, shops and galleries – often directing visitors away from ubiquitous high street chain stores to locally-owned back street boutiques.

The site is essentially a compilation of personal blogs, but it’s well-written and neatly laid out with Google Maps, comments and tags so you can search for ideas by location or theme. My only complaint is that users who leave comments will find them deleted when the page is updated.

The bloggers' travel guide to... Lisbon

Ginny McGrath goes digital to find the best blogs on the hottest places to eat, drink, shop and hang out

Related Internet Links

• Times Online's top 100 travel websites 2009

Related Links

• Times Online's top 100 travel websites

Geobeats offers short, fast-paced video guides presented by photogenic locals. Let Veronique guide you around a winery in Mendoza, Argentina, or wander around the bohemian neighbourhood of Belleville in Paris with Cecile (who sports a dashing black beret). In Manila, Roselyn presents a guide to Filipino etiquette.

The quality of the film-making is high – way better than the equivalent material on YouTube – and the content is compelling. The only problem is the lack of information on how to get around, where to eat and so on.

Travellr is a stylish new site that allows you to “connect with like-minded locals and past visitors”. Behind the cute web 2.0 features, it’s essentially an old-fashioned forum where you can post or answer questions.

The site is still in private beta (email privatebeta@travellr.com for a password) and some of the content is less than insightful. One user asks: “Am I going to get sick from the food in India?” Answer: “Yes”.

The site is fun to use: you can follow other travellers, find people by location and interests and browse recent questions on a map. Travellr is a taste of what Lonely Planet could achieve if it managed to organise the mountain of content on its Thorn Tree Travel forum.

Launched two years ago, YourSafePlanet offers to set you up with a local guide who can plan and coordinate your entire trip, even down to meeting you at the airport. Guides are vetted, the site claims, using police checks and employment records.

The service costs £45 for trip planning and support while you’re on the ground (airport pick-ups are extra), while for £200 you can unlimited global access for a year. Some destinations including Russia and China have obvious appeal, whereas in France and Spain most travellers could probably manage without having their hands held.

Localyte allows you to ask questions about any destination in the world, or set yourself up – with no checks – as a local “expert”.

Anybody can register and sell guiding services. In Tokyo, for instance, a student from the Philippines will recommend a customised city tour for $50. According to the site, he is one of its top five experts in Japan.

The best part of the site is the Q&A section, where would-be guides vie with each other to offer the best advice, earning points for each question they answer. The more points they accrue, the higher their rankings and – presumably – the more tours they sell. Clever.

Times recommends

• Oasis of the Seas: the Times review
• The 20 best new year party places to stay
• Green Spaces 2009: are you the winning writer?