The new Drinks Matcher, from Nat Decants, is a combination wine sommelier and bartender, all in the convenience of your smart phone.  You can quickly choose a wine whether you’re sitting at a restaurant, lounging poolside, or shopping at the supermarket or liquor store.  Since the app doesn’t require an internet connection, you can even use it when you’re dining on the patio and some remote tropical location.

Natalie says, “As a wine-loving geek, I love finding ways for new technology to help us savour all of life’s pleasures, wherever we are.”

To search for the perfect drink-food combination, start with either a dish or a drink.  From there, select bubbly, white, red, rose, or dessert, or opt for beer, spirits, cocktails, liquor, coffee or tea.  True connoisseurs can drill down their selection even further by focusing on a particular grape, more specific food information, or the primary flavor of spices used in a dish.

Choose to impress your friends, if you must, but what I like about the app is that it gets you out of a rut and forces you to try something new.  That’s worth the $2.99 charge in my book.

The Drinks Matcher app can be downloaded from your smart phone’s online store, or download it from Nat Decants.

Photo credit: Nat Decants

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The app claims to help you speak your mind in an array of languages, by providing useful emergency, flirtatious, and necessary phrases in Mandarin, French, Hindi, Japanese, Spanish, and Russian.  Not exactly the languages I’m looking for, but I chose Spanish and gave it a go.

There were a small handful of phrases designed to “help me out.”  Tap on the phrase that you need, and it’s repeated in perfect native tongue.  Sounds pretty darned good.  Except I can’t imagine needed phrases like “Help!  I just got swindled.”  Or “I’m new in town, can you give me directions to your apartment.”

The lines were fun and silly, and of very little use to a traveler outside of a laugh or two.

Don’t get me wrong, I love a good laugh.  But I don’t need to take up precious app space with a useless phrase guide.  This app got deleted almost as quickly as it took to download it.

Pass!

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It’s designed to keep you in the loop on how to eat locally – that is, what foods are in season and locally available – and will help you locate the nearest farmers market for a shopping trip.  You’ll even find a few cooking, recipes,  and menu tips courtesy of Epicurean.

While traveling, one of the healthiest and most budget conscious ways to eat is by shopping at a local market.  This little app can help make it a little easier while you’re on the go.  And with mapping ability, the app will detect where you are, choose a market that’s the closest, give you directions, and you won’t get lost either!

Using it at home will make you a healthier and more social conscious cook as well.

Available from iTunes for $2.99, or direct download for your iPhone app store.  You’ll more than recoup the cost of the app with your savings from one meal.

NOTE:  Currently only covers U.S. locations,

Photo credit:  Apple

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Check out Family Car Games, created by a family of four to help your family pass the time with instructions for 100 different games.  You can play the games in the car, on a long flight, or while waiting at the airport.  Or waiting anywhere for that matter.

I downloaded the app ($1.99) to check it out.  And hey – I like games, too!  There seemed to be a nice variety, hitting on a number of different themes, from words games to story telling to singing.  I recognized the names of some (so there are so classic car games here), but there were lots of titles that I didn’t recognize.  They claim that no additional equipment is needed, but I’d recommend a notepad and pen as many of them involve counting or keeping track.

You can select a game by various searches (name, degree of difficulty) or at random (a shaker/spinner much like is on Urban Spoon), and you have the ability to bookmark your favorites so you can play them again and again.  Each game is tagged with a degree of difficulty to help you choose age appropriate activity.

It looks like a lot of fun, and next time I’m spending time with a youngster, I’ll give it a more thorough testing out.  For $1.99, though, you can’t go wrong!

Download via iTunes or directly from your iPhone or iTouch.

Photo credit:  Family Car Games

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Here’s my list of the Top 10 application that I think are of use to travelers (listed in no particular order):

1. The Weather Channel – Check the weather at home, where you’re traveling, or where you happen to be at any given time.  Useful for planning what to pack, how to plan your vacation schedule, and all sorts of practical things.
2. Urbanspoon – Shake up your eating choices – literally – with this fun to use restaurant finder.  The app will hone in on your current location, giving you a variety of dining choices.  Pre-set your choices, or just let random selections come up.  Shake the iPhone and a new selection comes up.  I use this one a lot – even at home.
3. Currency – Converts dollars to pounds to Euros to Kunas and a whole lot more.  An excellent resource for international travel and money decisions.
4. AAA Discounts – A recent download frame, I now use this one all the time, whether at home or on the road.  The app zeroes in on your current location, then lists businesses in the area that offer AAA discounts.  No need to carry around the AAA guidebook, or look everything up on your computer before leaving home.  It’s right at your finger tips on your iPhone.  (NOTE:  I hear there is also a Blackberry version.)
5. Open Table – The online restaurant reservation site goes mobile, and it’s just as easy to use.  View available reservation times at restaurants around the country, and make your reservation right from your phone.
6. Seattle Metro – This is the Seattle bus schedule and service, and is a handy reference guide when I’m popping around town.  Find the local bus schedule, subway map/service schedule, or train schedule of the city or area where you’ll be visiting.  You won’t need to stand in front of a map wondering where to go because you’ll have the info at your fingertips.  (NOTE:  Some of these are FREE, other are available for around 99 cents.
7. Facebook – Keep in touch with your social media crowd, sharing your messages and photos.  This app lets you update and comment while on the run.
8. Skype – The great online phone and messaging service for your phone.  Now you don’t need a computer and/or headset, just make the calls from your phone for FREE or nearly free.
9. Flight Tracker – If you spend your travel time transiting airports, you know how important it is to know the status of your flight.  Learn about a timely delay and make changes on the fly.  Alerting you to a key delay will more than return purchase price investment, and business travelers will find themselves using it regularly.
10. Twitterific – There are other Twitter apps out there, but this is the one that I prefer.  Easy to use, and easy to send those 140 character messages to people.  Great to use at a conference to get people together, or let them know where the action is.  Not all travelers will be as enamored with this app as I am, but twitterers will want to give it a try.

What’s your favorite travel app?  Let me know if I missed a must-have!

Photo credit: William Hook @flickr

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No more toting around your guide book, all you have to do is download via iTunes are from the App Store on your phone or iTouch, and 160,000 discount locations are literally at your fingertips.

So let’s give it a test drive!

I downloaded the App to my iPhone, and figured I’d check out to see what discounts were available in my home area.  Oh dear – first pass shows no discounts close to home.  But – I’m given the option to expand the search area, and what do you know – there’s a drug store down the street that offers a discount to AAA members.  I wanted to expand to a little bit broader area, but once it expanded to find one discount location it didn’t give me the opportunity to expand further.

You can choose a route map to get you to the location, or pull up listed directions.  If you’re looking for a specific type of business (shopping, entertainments, dining, etc.) you can filter narrowly for only your preferences.  If you enter your AAA membership number you can open up additional functions, including a direct click to call for Roadside Assistance.

So far, it looks like a handy little app.  I never remember where I can take an advantage of a AAA discount, and now I’ll probably check a little more often.  I’ll look forward to trying it a bit more in depth when I’m on the road, but saving a few buck here and there all adds up.

Photo credit:  AAA

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With the recent release of EatSafe! travelers with food allergies (or those who need to avoid certain foods for any number of reasons), have an application to help the communicate when English is not the common language.

The premise is simple – to help you eat safe food.  And it operates like a series of flashcards, showing 18 common products that you may want to avoid.  There’s fish, dairy, wheat, dairy, peanuts, and others.  There are also a series of food pictures of things you may just prefer to avoid, like salt, peppers, onion, meat, and more.  All you have to do is scroll through to the food you need to avoid and point to it.  The universal circle with a slash through it conveys the message NO, I CAN’T EAT THAT.

This would be great in a restaurant or cafe, and even at the neighborhood market when you can’t read the content label.

You can download the app via your iPhone or iTouch, or download through iTunes.  $2.99.

Source: App Beacon

Image credit:  iTunes

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