There’s an app for that
Smart travellers pack a phone stocked with the best travel tech.
It’s all very well to unplug when you’re on holiday, but if your travels include a packed itinerary rather than a ‘‘fly and flop’’, then a smartphone loaded with apps is as essential as your passport. The travel industry has seen its share of disruptive tech innovations, from Uber to Airbnb to flight aggregators like Kayak and Skyscanner. These, along with Google Maps and TripAdvisor, are my bread and butter when travelling. However, there’s always something fresh to discover.
LuckyTrip
Saved up that annual leave but don’t know where to go? Give LuckyTrip a whirl. Combining the power of Booking.com, Skyscanner, Rome2Rio and the app’s own recommended activities, LuckyTrip lets you plug in your dates and budget and curates the best travel itinerary. Currently just available for Apple iPhones.
PackPoint
This app makes packing fun! No, not really, but the cool tech behind it will ensure you won’t forget your togs for Raro. Input a few details into Packpoint and out pops a bespoke packing list of all the things you’ll need. The list is shareable which helps if you’re trying to pass off that task onto a significant other.
Detour
Want to avoid the mass walking tours or after a niche topic tour? Detour is your own encyclopaedia of self-guided virtual walking tours. You do have to pay to have the virtual guide’s wisdom all to yourself but there are lengthy previews available before you buy.
CityMapper
This integrates live public bus and train data with walk and cycle routes as well as Uber and driving maps to create the easiest way to get from A to B. You can compare total travel times, with costs and the number of changes so you can best assess the cost of a taxi vs a 45-minute walk.
DayUse
Sometimes stopovers in a city are great. Other times they are a hellish blur of jetlag and back pain. DayUse lets you find and book hotel rooms at heavily discounted day rates (sometimes 75 per cent off the overnight rate), so you can get some much needed R&R before the next leg of your journey.
Wiffinity
Good backpackers know how to not spend a dime on roaming charges by only eating and staying at places that offer free wi-fi. Luckily for the rest of us, there’s Wiffinity. Best of all, the maps of wi-fi hotspots are both available offline (since that’s your initial problem). Another win for the sharing economy.
When you've got to go, you've got to go and that's when Flush – the public toilet finder – comes into its own.
Flush
Free wi-fi might not be essential, but toilets certainly are. When you’ve got to go, you’ve got to go and that’s when Flush – the public toilet finder – comes into its own. Free public toilets can be few and far between overseas. Let Flush have your back(side). Email if you have a travel issue you’d like Josh Martin, a London-based travel journalist, to write about.