Summer is the time of year when many people are getting ready to leave their winter homes and going off to other places, perhaps far away, where they can enjoy the season. A whole business has sprung up around this fact: Hotels and resorts have sprung up in all those areas that are most often targeted for summer vacations because of their scenic beauty and stores stock up on summer clothes, beach toys, canoes and other things that people use for recreation during the season. Since the development of the mobile phone, there have been a wide range of apps designed to help people to plan their summer vacations, just as there have been apps for everything under the sun. A sampling of them will be described in the sections below. Unless otherwise indicated, all apps are for the mobile phone and can be downloaded for free.
Best Mobile Apps for the Summer Traveler
TripAdvisor
This app definitely belongs at the very top of our list because it is one without which you absolutely should not go on vacation. With TripAdvisor, you can save a great deal of money on airlines, hotels and restaurants so that you will have plenty to spend shopping once you get there! Moreover, you can explore Indian tourism and tourism in other parts of the world as well using this app. The app can also tell you which ones are the best and at the click of a button you can read all the online reviews that previous customers have made regarding their experiences with them. You can even book reservations directly from TripAdvisor, view candid photographs by visitors, use the forums to get answers to any questions that you might have, find restaurant menus and discover what you can do at your destination!
Download TripAdvisor
Beautiful Planet HD
People who go on summer vacation naturally want to spend as much time outdoors as they can. For that purpose there is nothing better than Beautiful Planet HD, which is also ideal if you like to explore rather than plan a strict itinerary. Over 600 beautiful, stunning photographs and descriptions of sites throughout the world can be found here. Other features of Beautiful Planet HD include an interactive map onto which you can zoom to get as much detail as you would like, and writings by the app’s creator. The price of downloading is $1.99.
Marine&Lakes: USA
For those who especially enjoy water sports, Marine&Lakes: USA can serve any needs they might have. Its many features include:
- current weather reports, complete with wind speed and direction
- tide charts
- maps of the local area that give as much detail as any GPS plotter and which can be queried to find more detail about a given site
- a program that can use your past routes and fuel consumption rates to plan the most economical route for you
- a database that you can use to search for boat repair stations, restaurants, boat dealers, fuel stations (you can also check their prices here) and much more!
This is rather expensive for a mobile app, though; it costs $9.99 to download. It is also available in French, German, Italian and Spanish.
Download Marine&Lakes: USA
Rosetta Stone Navigator
Here is an app that was created by the same company that has been marketing software for learning foreign languages and that was named for the stone that made it possible to decipher the Egyptian hieroglyphs. The purpose of the app is to help foreign travelers learn basic words and phrases in French, German, Italian and Spanish, and has taken this task one step further: It has speech-recognition software that can tell the user if he or she is pronouncing words correctly. It can also serve as a travel guide that gives tips of all kinds that range from getting directions to dining out to getting acquainted with people.
Really Late Booking
Our final app work with both Android and iOS phones. It is perfect for those who tend to make vacation decisions on the spur of the moment: The user can book a room at a hotel on the same day (provided, of course, that there is a vacancy) and if it is a quality hotel, then a discount is provided too.