Using Tripomatic and Gtrot for Travel – Experience

A few weeks ago I reported on some great social media travel sites. This past weekend I was luckily enough to test some out for a trip I took to Chicago. Overall, they provided great value and functionality to my travels, and I’m happy to have used them.

To plan my trip, I first used Gtrot, which is a tool that connects with your social media profiles and pulls information from your friends. This includes where they live, where they’ve been tagged at, and where their pictures have been taken. It sound a bit creepy, but it is a great tool because seeing where your friends have been in the city gives you ideas of where you should go. After all, all of us take the opinions of our friends and family seriously.

After connected Gtrot to my Facebook profile, I was able to see the hot restaurants and shops that I should visit, many of which were places I wouldn’t typically find from online, because they weren’t tourist traps but places actual locals go. I was able to read reviews, see pictures of the locations, and see if my friends have been there. After searching, I saved a list of places I found interesting and continued on to my next step.

Using the places that I found in Gtrot, I went over to Tripomatic. Tripomatic doesn’t have any social media tie-ins, but I love that you can select locations on a mat, get directions, and export the entire trip plans. (I am an avid planner during trips.)

Tripomatic has a lot of activities and hotels already available on their tool, but the lesser-known attractions and restaurants aren’t included. This is fine for me, as start ups can’t be expected to have everything, and I think if it had the functionality that Gtrot did, it might be too much and make the look to confusing. It does allow you to add your own things to the map, so all I had to do was type in the addresses of the places I found in Gtrot and map them on my Tripomatic map.

After finishing my trip plan and exporting it, I was on my way.  I found it really useful for my trip. Unfortunately I wasn’t able to do everything I wanted, as some places were closed for Easter, but I did still have a great time.

I thank Gtrot and Tripomatic for their great tools and can’t wait to see them catch on with the public.

-Bryan Nagy