Resources For Outdoor Adventures and Travel
Planning a trip is easier with the right tools. On this page, I share my favorite apps, travel credit cards, and guidebooks that I use for hiking, photography, and travel. These resources save time, keep adventures organized, and help you make the most of every trip.
Looking for gear recommendations? See my favorite gear page for more.
Resources Apps For Hiking, Photography, and Travel
Technology can make any adventure smoother. Here, I highlight my favorite hiking, travel, and photography apps that help with navigation, trip planning, and photo editing. These are the tools I use regularly to stay organized, safe, and inspired.
Apps For Outdoors
Find Trails
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AllTrails
I pay for AllTrails Plus so I can download hiking trails to my phone and send the maps to my Garmin watch. AllTrails is the best hiking trails app for reading reviews from other hikers to determine trail conditions and see pictures from the trail.
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Hiking Project
I also use the Hiking Project app for finding hiking trails, and it has hikes not found on AllTrails. You can download an entire state’s (or country’s) worth of maps to find trails offline for free.
National Parks and Permits
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NPS
Learn more about the happenings in the United States National Parks. Get maps, road/trail closure alerts, find amenities, understand fees and timed entry, track your park visits, and more. A must-have resource for any National Park visit.
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Recreation.gov
Book campsites and permits, discover tours, buy timed entry tickets, and enter lotteries for applicable hiking trails. I love the Recreation.gov app because I can keep track of all my bookings in one place.
Good to Know
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Mountain-Forecast.com
The weather in the mountains can change quickly. It might be hot and sunny down in a valley and freezing with wind gusts at the summit. Get elevation-based weather reports for your next alpine adventure.
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Seek by iNaturalist
Identify plants and wildlife using your phone camera (works without cell service!). I love to know about any wildflowers I see along the trail, and this is a fun way to discover more about your surroundings.
Photography Apps
Photo Editing
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Lightroom Photo Editing App
You can use the Lightroom mobile app without a paid Adobe subscription! Limited to editing JPEGs and DNG files, it is excellent for editing phone photos. I pay for the Adobe Photography Subscription (Lightroom and Photoshop in a bundle) and still use the Lightroom app to easily download processed camera images to my phone.
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VSCO
VSCO is one of my favorite mobile photo editing apps. Edit phone images quickly with filters and simple editing tools. VSCO is fantastic for starting out because the filters offer a jumping-off point for further edits. I pay for the Pro version because of the tools it offers vs. the free version.
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SCRL
This is the best app for creating creative collage-style Instagram posts. You have up to 10 slides for free and can upgrade to get 20 slides. You can use any mix of panoramas, horizontal, and vertical images. I use this for practically all of my posts since I always have a mix of photo sizes. They also have some free templates.
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Unfold
While you can use Unfold to create a carousel, you only get 2 slides for free. Unfold is best for animated Instagram stories. Easy drag-and-drop into free templates. They also have Reels templates, but there is a small watermark with the free version.
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Lens Buddy
A special self-timer app that takes as many photos as you want with a custom time interval. For example, set the camera to wait 1 minute until it starts taking pictures, so you have time to hike out to a point. Then have it take 25 pictures with 3 seconds between each photo. Solo photoshoot made easy!
Travel Apps
Organize and Plan Your Trip
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TripIt
Automatically adds your flight, accommodation, and excursion information into a timeline when you give access to confirmation emails. You can also manually add any plans you want to include in the timeline. This is incredibly helpful for any length of trip.
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Viator
An incredible travel resource for booking experiences all around the world. Read reviews from other travelers, learn what to expect, and what’s included in the experience. Viator makes it easy to compare experiences so you can pick the one that best suits your needs and wants.
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Flaire
Keep track of your “want to go” and “been there” destinations and activities. See your saved places on a map and like lists created by fellow travelers.
While You’re There
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Rome2Rio
How do I get from here to there? Plane, bus, boat, train, Rome2Rio finds you options to get you to your destination. Includes travel time and pricing.
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CityMapper
Essential for walking and biking around major metro areas with super accurate location services. Get up-to-date information to find buses, trains, e-scooters, cabs, and more.
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GlobeTips
Use GlobeTips to determine the correct tipping percentage (and if tipping is expected at all) for restaurants, bartenders, tour guides, and more.
