If you can't find a parking space in crowded city, how do you do? It is really frustrating that you don't have a good idea to plan your travel, right? An iPhone application called PlaceExplorer can definitely help you solve above problems. It is just like your own smart tour guide.
When I drive out, I can't find a place to park my loved car. How can I solve it? No problem, just use PlaceExplorer's " search nearby POI" function to find nearby parking place. It will find all of them and list them from near to far.
After select the nearest parking place, just touch "navigate" button, PlaceExplorer will guide me to the place and finally solve my problem.
Unfortunately, after I park my car, I feel very hungry and really want to eat a hamburger in McDonalds. However, can't find anyone. I use PlaceExplorer again and add "McDonalds" as my own POI type. Then, find a McDonalds near me around 500 m to enjoy the hamburger in it.
How PlaceExplorer help me do trip planning? For example, I want to take my family to Japan this summer. I can use PlaceExplorer's "search" function and type "Tokyo", then all of the places related to Tokyo will be found.
I find Tokyo museum may be interesting so touch it to read more detailed information about it. Touch the "URL" line to surf it's official website. Touch the "Information" line to utilize Google's search engine to find all of the related information about it. I found lots of travel guides about Tokyo museum from search results, written by others, and are very useful to me. If your Japanese language skill is good, you could also make a call to it to book a tour guide in Tokyo museum. From the bottom of detailed view, there are lots of photos related to Tokyo museum. You could view them to have a whole picture about it.
PlaceExplorer also can help me plan the route to Tokyo museum. As you know, subway stations is ubiquitous and very convenient in Japan. So I touch "set as location" button to set Tokyo museum as my current location. Then, use "search nearby POI" function to search subway station.
Finally, I find a station called "東京地下鉄銀座線田原町駅" near Tokyo museum. Select it to enter detailed view and touch "navigation" button to enter navigation page. Select mode as transit, map as Google and start place as Tokyo museum. After touch start button, you can get the route from Tokyo museum to the station. If you want the route from the station to Tokyo museum, just reverse the start and destination. Finally, I save both places by touch "favorite" button, so I don't need to search them again next time. Just view them in favorite view. The above "set as location" with "search nearby location" and "Favorite" function really can make my trip planning become easy and interesting.
There is a tip about "set as location" function. I can not only set my location in detailed view but also in map view. Tap the place or location for about 1 second in the map view, and then it will be set as my current location. In addition to that, I can quickly switch my current location between the places I set before in the "set your location" list as following.
PlaceExplorer is definitely a pratical tool. You will never be lost if you have it, even in the places you never been or unfamiliar with. The function of "set as location " , "navigate", "search", "search nearby POI" and "favorite" is really a great tool to do trip planning. I suggest you to have it if you travel or go out frequently. By the way, PlaceExplorer with Apple map can almost have all of the functionality of navigation appilcations. If you don't want to spend lots of bulks to buy navigation application, you should consider PlaceExplorer.
