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Review: 1 000 Experiences app


Johannesburg, 17 Aug 2012

In July, I was lucky enough to take a little vacation to a home away from home for many South Africans - Thailand. While standing on a busy street in Bangkok or on a beach in Phuket, I often found myself wishing I had some sort of directory of interesting things to do. Not one for anything too touristy, I wanted a list of unusual foods to eat, the best location for a sundown cocktail, or the perfect spot to mingle with the locals. The Lonely Planet 1 000 Experiences app claims to provide travellers with the kind of lists I was looking for, but alas, it disappoints on many fronts.

The app opens with a stack of cards. Tap anywhere on the stack and a category will come up, for example, “The best city for a James Bond foot chase” or “The most lip-smacking street food”. Under each category are 10 locations one can visit to enjoy the activity or see the sites mentioned in that category.

Should you be looking to visit some of the “Happiest places in the world”, the app suggests you head to the cliffs of Bhutan or to the Lone Star State in the US to a town rather aptly named Happy. Having a midlife crisis? According to Lonely Planet, the best solutions lie in glamorous Monte Carlo or along Route 66 in the US.

Search tool?

As a starting point for those who want to go on holiday but aren't quite sure where they want to go, the 1 000 Experiences app is particularly useful. Each of the 1 000 experiences appear on a card with a picture of the location on the front and a brief synopsis on the reverse. The summaries give a short overview of the activity or location. Most include tips on the best time of year to visit the destination, as well as links to Web sites with more detailed information. There is also the option to “Share” the card by e-mailing it to others. Some cards even include Lonely Planet videos from the locations.

Essentially, it's a browsing tool that I would compare to paging through the latest Getaway or Go! magazines. But then again, even these have an index; the 1 000 Experiences app has no means for you to actually search for a specific location.

While perusing, I did discover a few gems located in Thailand. The Phuket Vegetarian Festival is listed under the “World's Strangest Festivals”. It is a religious festival during which participants skewer their throats and cheeks with metal and other strange objects, occasionally vegetables. I also learnt that Bangkok is listed as one of the “Hottest or coldest places in the world”, something I can attest to, having experienced the stifling heat and 90% humidity of this bustling city. Useful information, yes, but I wasn't able to actually search “Things to do in Thailand”, and just happened to stumble upon these ideas after several hours of browsing.

Customised lists

The promotional video for the app features Lonely Planet founder Tony Wheeler talking about how he “always liked making lists” and “hopes people are inspired to make their own lists”. I find this a tad ironic, as the app has no function for you to select the cards you are most interested in and actually make your own lists.

In Summary

Good: Beautiful images, detailed lists
Bad: No search function or option to create your own lists
Rating: 6/10
Price: $4.99

While looking through the lists, I often came across interesting locations, but later, when I went back to look them up, I had to trawl through all the lists again to find them. It would be nice to be able to “favourite” certain cards or, as mentioned earlier, create your own lists so that you can go back to them at a later stage and have a closer look.

Pretty pictures, just not enough

The images on each card are spectacular and these alone will make you want to visit Viti Lake, in Iceland, or Turtle Island, in Fiji, which are listed as some of the best spots to go skinny-dipping, by the way.

Should Lonely Planet update the app and 1 000 Experiences 2.0 be released featuring a search function, I would recommend it in a heartbeat, but unfortunately, at present, the app just feels a little incomplete.

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