What I Use: International Travel Apps and Services (Premium)

It’s been a few years since I last documented the mobile apps and services that I rely on while traveling internationally. So here’s an updated and expanded peek at what I really use.

And this should remain pretty consistent across the three international trips for which I’m currently booked for the remainder of 2018: The current home swap, in Stockholm Sweden, with a side trip to Berlin, plus Paris and then Dublin in October.

One of the interesting things, for me, anyway, is looking back over my previous “What I Use” posts and seeing how things have changed over the years. The basics, from the way I travel, pack, prepare, and the gadgets and other physical items I bring, has evolved, but have generally remained consistent. But thanks to the rapid explosion of mobile and cloud technologies, my use of apps and services is markedly different than it was when we did our first home swap way back in 2006.

Back then, “mobile” wasn’t really a thing: We had cell phones, or what passed as smartphones for the day. But they would not work in Europe, and we didn’t bother trying. Instead, my wife had purchased me an international-capable candy bar phone—a silver Nokia, I believe—with the idea being that we’d buy a SIM at each destination and use it for that one trip.

I don’t recall how well that worked in Paris in 2006, though I do remember a few screw-ups, like the time my wife and kids stayed in the city when I went back to the home swap house to work but had forgotten the keys: We had no way to contact each other, and realizing my mistake on the Metro, I got off where I knew there would be an Internet cafe and just worked from there. How we ended up meeting later is too hazy to call it a memory. But this is the type of thing that would never happen today: All of us, my wife, my kids, and I, have smartphones and everyone can be easily reached.

By the time we performed our second home swap in 2007, also in Paris, the first iPhone had been released, so I brought it with me. But I was scared to death to turn on the cellular capabilities: That first iPhone didn’t have a way to turn off roaming, and I had heard horror stories of people coming back from Europe with bills in the thousands of dollars. And AT&T had terrible international plans that were designed for a previous generation of non-smart phones. My iPhone was a curiosity, as it was only sold in the U.S. (and via AT&T) at that time. But I was afraid to even use it.

In 2010, I brought the first prototype Windows phone, the Samsung Taylor, to Germany on a home swap. But a more notable milestone, I think, happened in 2013, when I brought the Nokia Lumia 1020 along for our home swap in Amsterdam: That year, for the first time, I relied solely on a smartphone for our family trip photos, and the results were stunning. That was the last year I ever used a digital camera, and a rotating series of Windows phones, iPhones, and Google-branded Android handsets have been responsible for preserving our photographic memories ever since.

So looking at this year’s trip, it’s our 13 home swap overall, and the 12th in Europe. It’s also the 6th straight year in which my smartphone was the source of our trip photos.

Even looking at these past six years alone, things have improved. AT&T’s international plans got less and less expensive and more capable, as did Verizon’s, which my wife and kids use. (My wife buys a small international plan for each trip just in case.) More recently, I’ve switched to Google’s Project Fi, first temporarily during international trips and then full-time, starting in 2017.

The move to Project Fi has saved me a ton of money, especially with the recent monthly fee cap. But more important, Project Fi has turned cellular phone usage—voice, text, and data—into a non-event on international trips, eliminating what had previously been a major source of stress. Not only do I not worry about this anymore, at all, I can freely share my cellular connection with my kids as we walk around whatever city we’re in now, too.

So Project Fi is huge. I realize that most readers can’t take advantage of this. Looking at the U.S. carriers, I’d personally go with T-Mobile and its reasonably-inexpensive international day pass option if Project Fi wasn’t viable. Though, as noted, AT&T and Verizon are improving all the time too. (And that T-Mobile change could trigger further improvements, as is usually the case.)

When looking at booking flights for any trip, but especially home swaps, which take place during the most expensive time to fly to Europe, the summer, I use (and recommend) Google Flights (web). This incredible service helps you see what flights and prices look like over periods of time. And since we’re now living in Pennsylvania, we have access to four great international airports—Philadelphia, Newark, and JFK—and Google Flights will find the best airport option and the best dates over time.

(We always book flights directly from the airline, however. This is a long story that is unrelated to mobile apps and services. But we’ve found it’s always better to book direct rather than through services like Expedia because the lower prices you may get there often come with restrictions, too.)

Google does a good job of taking the flight and hotel information that it spies in your email and adding it to your calendar. But more interesting to me, frankly, is that you can then use Google Trips (Android, iOS) to organize your trips. This excellent app collects your reservations in a single place, and good lists of your saved places (from Google Maps), things to do, day plans, food & drink, and more. I still rely on some legacy tools here (like Rick Steves books) but I could see this app, plus recommendations from services like TripAdvisor, taking over.

Speaking of Google Maps (Android, iOS), that app, too, is key, and we use it extensively out in the world to find places and what’s nearby. Downloading the local area for offline use isn’t a horrible idea either. In the weeks leading up to a trip like this, my wife and I will often watch TV shows (which we buy on Apple TV) and YouTube videos about the place we’re going to visit. Then, when we learn about a restaurant or other place that looks interesting, I save it to Google Maps. And then the app works like a sort of visual to-do list: When we’re in a particular area, we see which saved places are nearby.

I take a lot of photos when I’m traveling, and I back them all up to both Google Photos (Android, iOS) and OneDrive. I share them publicly via Instagram (Android, iOS) (which can funnel them through to Facebook as well) and then share a more limited set, privately, on Facebook (Android, iOS). I usually do this when I’m out in the world, so it works like a sort of real-time representation of what we’re doing. You’re welcome to follow me on Instagram, but I only friend people on Facebook that I really know. (I also use Facebook a lot less than I used to, for whatever that’s worth.)

For language learning, my wife and I have both used Duolingo (Android, iOS) for years. I’ve stuck to alternating between French and Spanish. But my wife, who is much more proficient in French, has taken the time to learn the basics of the language of whatever country we visit each year. So this year, she’s used both Duolingo and Rosetta Stone (Android, iOS, and borrowed digitally from the library) to learn a bit of Swedish.

That said, I haven’t found language to be an issue on this trip. Part of the reason is the widespread use of English in Sweden. And part of it is Google Translate (Android, iOS), which works like magic: You can point your smartphone camera at a menu, sign, or another sample of foreign language and it will translate it in real time, overlayed over the image in the viewfinder. Microsoft Translate isn’t as sophisticated: You have to take a picture before the translation appears, but it’s always good to have a backup.

I purchased one month of access to ExpressVPN before the trip and made sure everyone had it installed on their PCs and devices. But even a few days here has shown that it won’t be necessary, as such things were in the past. The issue is two-fold.

First, services like Netflix and Amazon Prime Video actively block access when you’re using a service. And conversely, these services are more readily available internationally than used to be the case. It’s not the full set of content you see in the U.S. but it looks pretty close.

Second, VPNs slow things down. So when my son wants to place a game on the gaming laptop he brought—mostly Fornite, he says, but also a newer title, The Forest, that I’d not heard of—the VPN makes it unplayable. With the VPN off, he can get pings in the 30 range rather than 300 and just play on European services.

For my wife and I, watching Netflix and similar services isn’t a huge deal on a trip like this. But the family here does have an Apple TV, and I can cast to it from my iPad. So that lets me access streaming services in whatever capacity. I did test to see whether my purchased iTunes movies would play. They would not, nor would they play through Movies Anywhere. But I noticed that the movies that are available through Movies Anywhere will play through YouTube. Don’t tell anyone.

More soon. We’re heading to Berlin tomorrow afternoon, but I should be able to get some writing done most days this week.