Travel apps to see you through your holiday – from start to finish

There is a simple enjoyment – not least from the person you’re trying to speak to – about trying to communicate with a waiter in a restaurant when you don’t speak a jot of their language. But if you’re really keen to avoid a specific dish, or a hotel of horrors, then there are plenty of apps to offer salvation, from the planning stages to your holiday wind-down.

Planning the big stuff
Skyscanner boasts the comparison of more cheap flights, hotels and car hire than any other provider, while Kayak pulls in information from hundreds of travel sites all in one place. Airbnb is now a household name across the globe, as holiday landlords offer up their spare space for the fraction of the price of a private rental.  Once you have all your affairs in order, Tripit can keep them neatly organised in brightly coloured interface.

Not sweating the small stuff
Creating lists that you might not even have thought of, Packpoint helps even the most season travellers get organised. For the penny pinching traveller, XE currency allows you to see just how much bang for your British…er…buck you can get, while the more involved tripster can brush up on the language of their chosen destination through Duolingo.

While you’re there
Citymapper and Google Maps allow you to blend in as just another person glued to their smartphone instead of watching where they’re going, rather than a hapless tourist with a weathered print-out of…..Google Maps. Just watch out for those data charges….

For those who’ve not had the time or inclination to memorise key words and phrases, or are bamboozled by a metro system, Word Lens provides real time translation through your Smartphone camera. Of course you can still do it the old fashioned way by punching into Google Translate.

The “non-smart” option
It’s easy to forget that your smartphone is still, in fact, a phone, and is a useful device for storing emergency helpline numbers if you need to make any calls for support while on holiday. Fancy that. Call R Collins & Co on 01977 558391 for more travel information.