Taking a much needed vacation can be food for the soul,
but planning one out and keeping track of all the details can be overwhelming.
That's why in this video I am going to be giving you the best travel apps
to use that will take the stress out of your trip.
Dream vacations start here.
Hey it's Ben with Ben Thoennes Dream Vacations giving you weekly
travel information and tips that will help you plan for your next vacation.
So if you're new here consider subscribing.
So the first app I am going to cover is called trippit.
Tripit is a travel planner and what it does is create a master itinerary for you.
So once you open the app this is the screen you'll get. And you'll have two choices.
One you can connect your email to tripit and what it does is look for anytime you book a trip it'll
scan your emails and pull up that confirmation number and add it to the tripit itinerary for you.
There's nothing more you need to do. Or you can forward your confirmation
emails to the tripit email account there and they'll add it for you.
Now you can also add it manually as well so that's an option.
So once you have a trip that you want to take uh you can enter your trip name your destination,
the dates and you can put a description there as well.
So for example this uh the trip I am doing here is a Ft. Lauderdale trip in December of this year.
You can add Siri to it to help create a shortcut to your travel plans.
Now if you're going to enter manually this is the screen you'll look at and you can
see there's a lot of activities you can add to your itinerary from anything you can think of
Including flights, hotels, activities, restaurants, meetings, parking,
concerts, cruises anything you can think of you can put it in this itinerary.
And once you have the details of your trip loaded into tripit
this is what your itinerary will look like.
It will have all the information you need for your trip.
So here as you can see this is my trip here going to Florida.
I can see the dates of the trip, my airline information, my rental car pickup,
the hotel I am going to be staying at and also the reservations to a restaurant I picked out as well.
Another cool feature of this app is that it also includes
COVID 19 guidance so wherever you are traveling to
it will have what kind of restrictions it has for the destination you're going to.
So for this example I have myself going to Florida and you can see the travel
restrictions for Florida here obviously they say it says the infection level is extreme.
Is vaccination required? Is there a quarantine testing required? The policies,
hot spots within Florida.
Are masks required? Domestic restrictions, health documentation, and entry rules, exit rules,
international travel, pretty much everything you need to know about COVID 19 in that area.
You can also upload pdfs, photos, QR codes, boarding passes. Whatever you need,
in the app so you have all the information at your fingertips.
Tripit also has a map view so if you're doing a road trip it's good for this as well. Works much
like google maps. It will show you restaurants, ATMs, driving directions and parking as well.
Another great feature about this app is that it also includes safety scores for
neighborhoods around the world which is really cool especially if you're going
somewhere new for the first time and have no idea which area of town is considered safe.
It will have a variety of categories such as women's safety,
political freedoms and access to health and medical services.
Now this is the free version of the app. There is a pro version you can get for about $50 a year.
With the pro version you get real-time flight status, it will monitor flight refunds for
you and it'll also let you know how long the security lines are which is a really cool feature
and it also have interactive airport maps and terminal maps for you to use as well.
The next app is called Omio. Omio is a ticket booking engine for trains, buses,
ferries and even flights but it is just exclusive to just Europe, US and canada.
This app is really good for booking on the go and helps you avoid long lines and they
partner with over 800 transport companies so you can almost always get a good deal on tickets.
They do provide travel safety updates and they have an English customer service line that is open
24/7 so that if you have any issues you can get a hold of somebody no matter what time of day it is.
And the app is really easy to use you just enter in two destinations.
So for example we have Berlin and Prague and it'll pull up best prices for train tickets.
You could also look up flights so instead of going to Berlin to Prague,
I want to go from Berlin to London and here you can see the sorted by cheap and fast,
so the cheapest and fastest is on Ryanair for 131 dollars.
So again just a really good app for last minute ticket deals.
The next app is called check and fly. This app was created by the Airport's Council
International and what this app does is that it compiles health and safety information
directly from the airports so that you know what to expect before you arrive.
The airports can even communicate with you directly through the app with the most
up-to-date information so that you can be prepared for every aspect of your trip and avoid surprises.
So here's a look at the app. Once you are on the app you have a choice
of searching between the departure airport and the destination airport.
For this example I am choosing the Paris airport of Charles de Gaulle. And once it brings up you
can see all the health safety measures involved and then if you click on the little eye
information icon it breaks it down by arrivals, general, safety, and services.
This is a really good app to use when you are traveling especially international with all the
different restrictions around. It can tell you up to date information for the destination you
are going to so you are not surprised or unprepared for where you are going.
The next app is google translate and really this is a must-have app if you're going to
be traveling overseas to a country where you don't know the language.
A good feature about this app is that you can download an offline
translation file so you can use the app without having an internet connection.
But the best feature about this app is that it has an instant camera translation
feature which is great if you are trying to read a menu or a sign or any type of text.
You just point your camera to whatever text you are trying to translate and it instantly
translates it into English for you which is great when you need something translated pretty quickly.
Another good feature about google translate is that you can save words or phrases on the app.
So if you know you are going to be saying a lot of the same words or phrases a lot,
you can save those onto the app and pull them up really quickly and you can also have the
app audibly say those phrases for you so you can hear the pronunciation of the language.
And yet another good feature about google translate is that it has a conversation
button so you can hit that button say the phrase in English and it
will automatically translate it to you in the language that you want translated.
This is really helpful if you are going to be at a restaurant
or need directions, or you are buying something from a vendor.
So you could say the phrase in English, it'll translate it into the language that you are
having a conversation with and so the vendor or whoever you are talking with
can hear that translation and you can have that conversation back and forth.
And before I go on to the next step if you are finding this information helpful
make sure to like the video and let me know in the comments below if you have used any of
these apps I've mentioned so far or if you have a favorite app that you like to use for your trips.
So the next app is the XE currency converter. This app is also very
useful if you need to convert currency and want to know what the current rates are.
So whenever you open the app it will automatically update and give you a live
accurate up to the minute currency conversion rate.
And the next app I recommend is Whatsapp.
If you don't know what whatsapp is it's a free messaging and video call
app and what it allows you to do is connect with your friends and
family while you are traveling by just using an internet connection.
So when you are traveling in another country with no ability to text or call because you
don't want to splurge for that international cell phone plan then whatsapp fixes that
problem by allowing you to text and video message with just an internet connection.
All you need is your phone number, there are no usernames or logins to remember.
All you have to do is open the app and start messaging.
And it even works with slow connections. Just note that the people that you are
sending messages to will also need to download the app in order to receive your messages.
And the last app I am going to recommend to you here is called Skyscanner.
This app will let you find flights from all over the world.
Now you can also use it to find hotels and rental cars but the best feature about this app
is that if you are looking for some of the cheapest places to fly to from your home airport
then in the "to" section you will just type in "everywhere" and it will bring up a list
of options from around the world from your home airport that you can travel to.
And you can also search by month, so if there is a particular month that you want to fly
out of you can just type in that month and it will bring up a list of options for that month.
And you can find the cheapest prices within those dates. Doing that will help you get
some ideas of where you want to travel to if you're undecided or on a budget.
Now these apps will certainly help you stay organized and even relieve some
of the stress and planning for your next vacation.
But for those of you who would rather have someone else plan,
book, and figure out all the details of your trip
why not consider someone like me, a travel agent to help you plan and book your next vacation.
If that is something that you would be interested in you can find a link to my
website in the video description below or feel free to email me at bthoennes@dreamvacations.com
Make sure to like the video if you found this video helpful and consider
subscribing to get more travel related videos just like this one.
Thank you so much for watching and I hope to see you in a future video!