Maps.me/app for building an itinerary

TripIt does a good job of keeping most itinerary items in one place. It doesn't produce a single map with all your pins in it, but it does import most email confirmations (flights, trains, ferries, lodging, etc.), along with certain tours or other notable events. Some of that info will need to be manually input, but any location info it captures links to a map, so it's easy to click and show a driver or someone else where you need to go as long as that info is in the TripIt itinerary.

I use Googles "My Maps", which I love - you can create multiple itineraries, get directions and so on. There's a bit of a learning curve but not that bad, and once you get it, it's easy. And there are lots of tutorials online. Everything is saved in the cloud, of course. The nice thing is that you can use it in conjunction with Google's regular maps and GPS.

I use it for every trip - I have one general itinerary, then create separate ones for each city (I think you have have up to 10 pins for each layer and up to 10 layers). If you need more, then just create a new map.

Thanks Mardee. Does google allow you to put in detailed info for restaurant possibilities and museums? I'd like to have detailed info beyond flights and hotels for each day. I'm looking less for Navigation and more something that has trip detail by day all in one place.

Jules, what Google does is lets you list the place but when you insert it, it has a link to Google maps, which gives you the directions and also any information that would be available online (reviews, menu, etc). There is also an option to add notes to it of your own. It's hard to explain without photos. You might just want to try it out and play around with it.

BTW, I just remember that a friend was telling about Wanderlog a few months ago. He used it for a trip and said it was very helpful. I totally forgot about it until just now. He said it was easy to use and you can import the items into Google maps for later. It sounded like it had a lot of useful features.

A warning about Google's MyMaps as it works now, web-based rather than as an app: You need to have Wi-Fi or cellular data to move the map, zoom in or zoom out. We used to tell people (when MyMaps was an app) to open the local map in the morning while on their hotel's Wi-Fi and they'd be fine all day even if they didn't have a data plan for their phone or tablet. That no longer works.

On my last European trip (2019) I used less than 1 GB of cellular data per month. In the first month of my current trip, I used nearly 2 GB of data, and Month 2 is looking worse. The only difference in my data usage is that I now need to have roaming turned on when I'm wandering around. I don't always remember to turn it off when I go in a museum, which doesn't help help.

The amount of data I'm using probably would not be significant to a traveler who has bought a local SIM, but users of Google Fi like me pay $10 per GB of data when in Europe. I wonder whether that had anything to do with Google's decision to change MyMaps from an app to a web-based service.

I liked MyMaps. With a bit of practice I was able to build maps quickly even when I had dozens of pins (in a few cases over 100) for a city. You can add some extra info in the Name field, which is where I put hours of operation and sometimes a brief description (e.g., Tex-Mex buffet, contemporary art and crafts, etc.). There's also an additional field where you can add more text. When you click on one of your pins, a box pops up that includes everything you've entered plus the address and rating from Google.

Useful though I've found MyMaps to be, I'll be dumping it for one of the mapping apps before my next trip. $50 a year is too much to pay when there are other options, and the web-based Google Maps will cost me at least that much in 2022.

I'm not aware of any itinerary-building feature in MyMaps.

I too am a Google Maps user, and I always cut paper copies of maps and directions from place to place. It also helps greatly when planning trips because I can click on "auto" or "public transportation" to figure distances, directions and even the train/bus numbers.

Whenever i hit a big city and find a place to stay, I magnify the city map and know the lay of the land including restaurants, the names of the streets and where the metro stations are.

I'm looking less for Navigation and more something that has trip detail by day all in one place.

@jules m... That's exactly what Tripit does. : )

Thanks for all the thoughtful ideas.

I gave Trip it a try this past weekend. My sense is there is nothing that does what I want. Our trips have become longer, almost a month this time. I use small, family owned inns when possible so they have to be manually inserted into Trip it. Currently, I make a word document that has the hotel, drive times, appointments (like wine tasting), planned museums and walking tours, planned and possible activities and a handful of restaurants. It will often have little notes on whether there is an included breakfast, parking tips, scenic spots we may want to stop and with tips like navigating a certain train station, for example. Copying and pasting into a document can take so much time, yet, our plans do not always conform to an app, it seems.

Our travel style is typically "road trip". We generally stay at inns 2-4 days, and often stay at over 10 places.

I tend to not use data internationally, I only use wifi where available.

I like Maps.me for navigation, a lot. My "tech support" (kids) used to use google maps and they've all switched to Maps.me They do occasionally look things up on google and then somehow import it to Maps. me. However, I am annoyed that the app did not retain my history when my phone fried. It's funny, I play a couple silly games and my history was saved with those. Quite a few of the apps did have my history, just not maps.me

Jules M, we usually travel for a month or more and try to stay few places with appropriate day trips. I have tried some apps for itinerary listing - dumped them. Instead, use my word processor and/or spread sheet to create a list with plane/train/bus details plus details for each place to stay. I make them detailed enough that we generally do not need to look up info on our smart phones or elsewhere. Also I create a separate detailed list for each stay place covering what to see when, desired attractions (ticket info if advance purchase), suggested restaurants, getting bus/metro passes with important stops and so on. The "travel & stay list " is given to our kids or anybody following our trip. The "City list" can be tossed as you move on. Of course we each have copies and a copy is on a Google account. We find the paper list handier to use and easy to mark up if necessary. But, IMO, the best virtue is that, after compiling all this info, we have a good grasp/memory of what, where and when for the trip. And we can create a list of what we deem important.

Jules,
I had the same problem a couple months ago when I got a new phone and the mapsme app transferred the maps but not the 'pins'/bookmarks. I spent days off and on trying to figure out how to get them by googling questions. I even asked for help on the forum. There were two answers that said that they 'just transfer over'. Which obviously didn't work for me.

I gave up and didn't look at mapsme for about a month. Then I opened the app again to start a new map and surprise.....all my previous maps and bookmarks were there. I have no explanation, but suggest you just keep opening the mapsme app every few days.

Jules, I'm curious - did you have the option to backup bookmarks turned on in your settings? If that was on, it should have saved them when you opened it on a new device.

Thank you all for your ideas.

@Mardee, I never consciously backed up the maps.me app. When I looked in the settings just now, I saw that back up is enabled. I'm not sure if it backs up to my cloud or to the app. In any case there wasn't anything backed, but I sure will be backing up them, now!

@Lynn, I should turn off my phone more than I do. Based on your comment, I've turned it off and on a few times with no luck. It was a good suggestion, though, because that has happened to me with computer updates and app updates, where it seems like everything got messed up and then at some point the app returns with my settings. It was a great idea.

@Larry, usually our trips don't lend themselves to just a few "base" cities, but we certainly make daytrips when it makes sense to us. I think we construct similar types of itineraries. I also like to have much of my info in one place and on paper. I don't necessarily make our itineraries very specific to the day unless a reservation was necessary or if I run into places that are closed on specific days. I have a list of what we'd like to do by location and then decide based on the weather and other factors what we will do each day. I like to have restaurant ideas that I've researched, museums and other attractions listed with hours and days open. I often will copy and paste important information to my itinerary. I love the end document but it is a little complex to construct so I was hoping there was something out there that works. So what I decided to do is to make individual itineraries for each region we visit. It is easier to do for adding info and editing. I will print them out separately. I do have separate ziplocs for regions, already. Sometimes they have guidebook pages, brochures, maps, etc. So I'll just put the appropriate itinerary into each bag.