Clever is Cool.

I recently purchased an iPhone 7+ which has twice the memory capacity of my old iPhone 5S.

Since purchasing the device I have spent a lot more time researching useful apps, with specific interest in travel; this considering that my family and I are travelling to the United States for nearly a month and I am heading into unfamiliar territory.

TripIt

One of the best apps I’ve come across whilst browsing the store is the TripIt app. The app allows you to create an online itinerary keeping note of all of your reservations, flight details, addresses, important information like passport details and emergency contacts organising all of your itineraries and confirmations in one incredibly easy to use dashboard. I initially purchased the app to create a basic itinerary that could be shared with our families, so that they would know where we were at any given time considering the sometimes astronomical expense to make international calls back home from abroad.

To be completely fair, I don’t think our mums are so concerned with our whereabouts but moreso our 11 year old son.

One of the coolest things about the app, is that you can forward all of your confirmation emails from your registered email address to the email plans@tripit.com were all of the data will be collated, aggregated, and a master itinerary will be created within the application itself.

TripIt is free, however you can choose pay for advanced features in the Pro version of the app.

SeatGuru

 

Although I didn’t find this app until after we’d booked all of our flights, the SeatGuru app gives you insights into the layout of an aircraft, allowing you to be make a more conscientious decision when selecting your seats.

Although most economy seats are created equal, there are usually a dozen or so seats on an aircraft that have misaligned windows, are wayyyy too close to the bathrooms for comfort or don’t have access to power for charging small handheld devices making them even less desirable than other standard cattle class seats.

Use SeatGuru to help you choose the best seat so that you can travel in a little more comfort than you might without the insider knowledge!

Rome2Rio

Rome2Rio is an app that allows you to plan your travel from a to b, in over 158 countries worldwide. You can enter any town, address or landmark as your destination and Rome2Rio will instantly display flight, train, bus, ferry and driving options with estimated travel times and fares based on aggregated and ranked information sourced from multiple APIs and published within its platform . The travel search engine contains route information from over 4,800 transport operators, however has been criticised by travellers in European locations as omitting a lot of the low cost aircraft operators from their flight results.

Users of the app have commented on their appreciation of it’s simplistic format making it incredibly user friendly, with others advising that the financial results provided by Rome2Rio should be used as a guide only.

LoungeBuddy

Unfortunately for my husband, son and I, I’m not fancy enough to have a lounge membership with any airliner, nor do I have a frequent flyer pass that allows me to travel in style. I traverse the stark, tiled floors of airports just like any other schlep! The good news is however, Auckland International Airport allows limited lounge access to its Emperor Lounge for travellers at a small price of $49 NZD for 3 hours. You can pay a fraction more if you’re a long haul traveller in need of a nice, hot shower as towels are provided and if necessary staff can arrange hotel reservations for you.

The lounge has an assortment of local and international food on offer to its visitors, as well as non-alcoholic beverages and a stocked bar. The website indicates that there are desk spaces setup for you to connect and charge your hand held devices and laptop equipment, and children chaperoned have access to a small play area.

For 2 adults and a child under the age of 12, I paid $122.50 for 3 hours of access. We plan to arrive to complete our bag drops via the Air New Zealand kiosks early and head into the lounge after customs for some well needed R&R.

Lounge Buddy isn’t partnered with the Auckland International Airport, however did display results for Honolulu and JFK airports.

There are two lounges located in Honolulu Airport, both very reasonable priced. User reviews indicated that the IASS lounge didn’t offer much aside from tea, coffee and soft drinks and much of the commentary maligned the dated cheap motelesque decor.
On this basis, we elected to opt for the much more extravagant Lufthansa Business Lounge in New York’s JFK Airport. With our flight back to the island being a non-stop 11 hours, I figure we will need the preparatory relaxation.

The Lufthansa Business Lounge offers a tonne of amenities, including premium buffet, beer & wine, spirits & liquor, snacks, TVs, high speed wifi and supplied internet terminals. Prices at $84 NZD per person, you get full access to all of these amenities.

These are only some of the clever apps I found to make your travel much less anxiety ridden. As a person who can be highly strung in stressful or unknown situations, I feel like any support system your smartphone can offer is a godsend.

Better living everyone!

Charli x