EUROTRIP

illustration by Tania Kaufmann

04-20-10

Lonely Planet iPhone Guides for Europe: Free for a limited time

Thanks to Iceland’s Eyjafjallajokull Volcano, many people in Europe are stranded without a plane home.
Lonely Planet decided to offer 12 of their iPhone guides of Europe to download FOR FREE until April 23rd so those stranded people can “make the most of their “unexpected” holiday”. I saw this and immediately started downloading! Those things cost about $17 a pop! The cities include: Amsterdam, Barcelona, Berlin, Budapest, Copenhagen, Istanbul, London, Moscow, Munich, Paris, Rome & Stockholm. I recommend downloading them with a wifi connection instead of 3G, otherwise it will take FOREVER.

I have played with these apps some and review them below:

I was playing with the app and it has some cool features. Some people complained in the reviews that it doesn’t have as much information as it does in the actual books. I think the app is more for a quick reference rather than a replacement for the actual book.

The first tab is reference from the book that is organized like a table of contents, although each city varies on the amount of information it gives you. It contains some history about the city, a short list of cost comparison (how much a 3 course meal costs, a beer, tickets to an event, etc.), when festivals are, places to eat, drink & stay. Be warned that it’s best to research where you might stay and not rely on this app, as many reviews complained about the app not listing enough hotels or that it was only focused on no more than 2 people. Like I said, it’s better as a quick reference on this part.

The second tab is “Nearby” which, if you have internet/3G access, it will tell you all the surrounding places to see that are closest to you along with directions. We are only using our iPhones under wifi unless we can get an appropriate SIM card for the country we’re in, so this tab won’t be super handy all the time.

The third tab is a map of the city. It will show you were you are through the GPS, BUT the best feature of this map is to be able to use it offline. The map also have marks of interest on pins, much like google maps, that have little symbols so you know what they are. (bars/restaurants, museums, hostels/hostels, etc) These can also be filtered out.

The fourth tab is a search feature where you can type in a point of interest or a type of interest and a whole list will pop up. I typed museum and all the museums came up, when one is selected it gave me what bus will take me there, the address, phone number and most important, the hours of operation. This feature also works offline. You can also bookmark these to find later in the next tab.

Also in the fifth tab, besides the bookmarks, is a collection of professionally shot images of the city, which is kinda silly, but I guess are all the images from the book.