Episode 21: Tech Tools for the Traveler on Your Holiday Gift List

Mary Herendeen:

Welcome to Traveling With AAA. I'm your host, Mary Herendeen, and today I'm joined by Gary Arndt, who's an award-winning photographer, a social media influencer, and a podcaster. He's the host of Everything Everywhere Daily, a podcast for intellectually curious people that has about 600,000 downloads a month. He's traveled to more than 200 countries, all 50 states twice, and all 7 continents. Follow him on Instagram, @everythingeverywhere, and on Twitter, @EverywhereTrip.

Gary, thank you so much for being here with us.

Gary Arndt:

Thanks for having me.

Mary:

Yeah, very excited. I understand that in 2007, you sold your house and traveled nonstop for 9 years, which launched you into a whole new career. What prompted that decision to pick up and take off and explore?

Gary:

I had to do something (laugh). I had an internet company that I started in the ‘90s and I sold it and I was looking for something to do, and I came up with the idea of traveling around the world. So I thought I would do that for a year or two, and then it kind of just never stopped. For a little over 9 years, I didn't even have a home. And then after that, I was on the road maybe a half to a third of the year up until the pandemic started.

Mary:

Wow. Now, you've said you've been to more than 200 countries, all 7 continents also, while keeping up with the latest technologies. What travel tech tools would you recommend to travelers and which ones might make good holiday gifts?

Gary:

I've become a huge fan of the Apple AirPods Pro. The nice part about it is they have noise canceling, which means that you don't need the big bulky over-your-ear headphones to necessarily travel with anymore. You can just have something that goes in your pocket. And I keep these in my pocket all the time. I carry them with me because they're so small and so portable that if you ever want to stop and listen to something, you can do that.

Plus they also have a transparency mode, which means that in addition to noise canceling, you can have a mode that will let you hear everything that's going on around you while you're listening to something else. So if you're concerned for safety reasons, like getting hit by a car or something like that, because you're not paying attention, the transparency mode can take care of that.

Mary:

Ah, that's interesting. I didn't realize that that was a function or a feature of that at all. I will generally want to keep the volume low if I'm listening to something just so I can hear the kids in the background. What a great feature. Now what about Apple AirTags, since we're on Apple right now. Do you recommend them and are there any drawbacks?

Gary:

I think there're handy if you want to track your luggage. There are other air trackers out there, but the way a lot of the tracking works is that it's dependent upon other Apple devices being in the vicinity to be able to pick up a signal and then relay the location of it. So you're probably going to have better luck, especially at airports, with something like an Apple tag.

I'm certainly not against them. I haven't purchased any yet, but from everything I've seen, I've seen people that have found their bags, that they've been able to file complaints against an airline. When they say they don't know where their bag is, they're able to say, “Well, I do know where it is, you know, (laughs). It's still located at the Frankfurt airport, it's in this terminal and this is exactly where it is.” And they've been able to hunt it down.

Mary:

Yeah, that sounds especially helpful. Do you use anything else instead, if not the AirTags, to keep track of your luggage?

Gary:

Not really, because the AirTags came out after the pandemic, so the vast majority of the time I was traveling, we never had any sort of technology like that.

Mary:

Awesome. Well, what about travel apps for your smartphone? Are there any that you wouldn't be without?

Gary:

The biggest one I think is TripIt. That's something I use for a lot of travel planning. Every time I get an airline reservation, a hotel reservation, a car rental reservation, I forward the email I get for confirmation to TripIt. They suck it into their system and then puts it on your app so you have an itinerary of everything, of where you're going to be staying. They send you notifications if you have a flight, and—I think this is available on TripIt Pro—if there's a change in your gate, it will usually tell you even before the airline does that there's been a change in the gate. So TripIt Pro is something that I always use.

And then the other big thing is Google Translate, which is free. But it's so handy and in addition to just maybe typing something out if you need to talk to someone, you can also put the camera and point it at a sign and it will do an on-the-fly translation reading whatever’s on the sign from the camera, so you can see what it is.

Now the translation isn't necessarily perfect, but you can usually get the gist of it if it's “no parking” or whatever it happens to be. You can do that. And between those things, it really makes life a lot easier when you travel. When I started traveling back in 2007, it was literally 3 weeks after Steve Jobs announced the iPhone. So there were no smartphones when I started traveling. And that has been the No. 1 thing without question that has changed how we travel over the last decade.

Mary:

Yeah, we don't realize it's just been that decade and things have really, really changed. Any other technology that you would suggest outside of the AirPods and the Pro of TripIt?

Gary:

I'm a big fan of the Amazon Kindle. When I started traveling, you know, you have downtime, you like to read, and finding English language bookstores on the road was difficult and they're usually very expensive, especially if you're in a country that English isn't the primary language. And with the Kindle, it changed all that.

Just to give you an idea of how powerful it is, I had a Kindle that had a 3G radio in it. And I was on a boat to the island of St. Helena in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean and was leaving from Cape Town. And I realized I was going to be on this boat. It's 5 days to get there, and it takes another 5 days back. And then on St. Helena, there was no internet at the time, so I was basically going to be 20 days with nothing to do. So I, as the ship was pulling out, I ran up to the top of the ship, got a 3G signal, downloaded all the Game of Thrones books, which are really long, and managed to get them all before we were leaving port.

So I'm a huge fan of e-readers in general and the Kindle just because you have such a wide selection and you'd never have to worry about something being in stock or the price or anything else.

Mary:

Yeah. Just the compact ability and that it's, you know, versatile. You can get any book

Gary:

And the batteries last a long time, and the newest version, what's really nice is that they're also waterproof. So if you want to read it in the bathtub or by the side of the pool or something like that, you don't have to worry if it falls in. It should be fine.

Mary:

Yeah. That's awesome. Well, thank you. Now, you finally settled down in 2016 and got an apartment to have a base in between trips. Are you starting to travel again post-pandemic? And where might you be headed in 2023?

Gary:

All of my time right now is taken up with my new podcast that I started in the pandemic. It's gone far better than I ever thought it would. At the beginning of a show, you said I'm getting 600,000 downloads a month. It's actually closer to 900,000 now. It's just been going like gangbusters and that's literally become my full-time job, far more lucrative than travel writing or travel photography ever was. So I'm probably going to start traveling at some point soon again. But it's going to be very different than what I was doing when I was on, you know, basically traveling for more than a decade. I'll probably be staying in one place for an extended period of time and then moving from here to there.

One of the things that's changed a lot in the last few years is that more and more countries are now offering what’s known as digital nomad visas. You can stay for an extended period of time up to a year in many countries if you are working remotely or doing something like that. Barbados, Estonia, Georgia, a bunch of countries are doing this because they realize it's easy money. People are coming to your country and spending money for an extended period of time. They're not taking jobs away from locals. And it's an excellent way to travel and continue making a living at the same time.

Mary:

Yeah, that's really interesting. I hadn't heard of that. So are one of those countries on the list?

Gary:

Oh, yeah. I'd love to go back. I've been to all those countries, but I'd love to go back to Barbados. And more and more countries are starting to do it, so it's just a matter of finding a place that works with you. Sometimes there is some paperwork you have to go through. But it's just a matter of finding an apartment for at least several months or maybe up to a year, making sure they have decent internet. You can just live there for a while.

Mary:

Wow. Wow. That's really exciting. Congrats on the success of the podcast. That's really exciting to be able to turn something that you love and the travel writing when we put an end to travel, doing the podcast. So that's really exciting.

Gary:

The podcast is not a travel podcast, but one foot is kept in the world of travel. It's about people, places, and things from around the world. And many of the stories are based on things that I encountered while traveling, or, you know, things that I learned or things that I experienced. And I'm always interjecting stories about places I've stayed or things I've done. And I've gotten a lot of people who have been more encouraged to travel probably by coming at it through a back door by just talking about the places than it was by just necessarily talking about travel directly. And I'm also probably going to be running tours starting next year as well, educational tours, and we're going to be doing our first one in Rome.

Mary:

Wow. That is really exciting. And to your point, you know, you said it's one foot in the world of travel, but really, everybody's looking to have more experiences and with influencers, we're really looking to see who's done it before, what did they experience, and you know, people are more inclined to want to travel based on your own personal experience. So it's no surprise that it's been so successful. It's exciting.

Gary:

Yeah. One of the things I wanted to do when doing a tour is, there's lots of companies that do tours. So for example I've led them in Italy and you start in Venice for a few days, and then you go to Florence and then you go to Rome, so you're always just kind of spending a few days in every place. But the thing is, for a city like Rome, there's so much there that the average tourist never sees because they're not there long enough. So they go to the Trevi Fountain, they go to the Coliseum, they go to the Vatican, and that's pretty much the whole experience for a lot of people. But there are close to 3,000 years of history in the city, and there's a lot of things that you're only going to see.

So the tour I want to run, it's going to be a 1 hotel room tour. You check in and then we're going to spend 10 days in Rome. We're going to go up to Tivoli and see Hadrian’s Villa, we're going to see the Villa d’Este, we're going to go to Antica, we're going to go to the Vatican catacombs, which hardly anybody ever gets to see. Nero's Palace, which again, is very difficult to get access to.The restaurant, which is the current location where Caesar was actually assassinated. And you can go into the basement and see that.

So there's lots of these things that people miss. And I think this is also true all over the world, especially in major cities where there's so much deep history. But if you're only there for a few, you know, 2 or 3 days, you miss a lot of it.

Mary:

Yeah. You see a lot of people more looking to travel for a longer experience, more of the living like a local, and to see those things they would otherwise not have the time for. Now, bringing it back to the us, you've been to every U.S. state, you said twice. Tell us about some of your other travel quests. Maybe do you have a goal to visit all U.S. National Parks?

Gary:

I'm very close to all the U.S. National Parks, and I would've done it if it wasn't for the pandemic. The ones I still have to visit are actually pretty easy to visit. So it's several in California, 1 in Texas and 1 in the Virgin Islands. I've been to the hard ones. I've been to all the Alaskan parks and American Samoa, which are the difficult ones to get to. In California I have to visit Channel Islands, Kings Canyon, Sequoia. Oh, and then I should also add, there's a brand new National Park in West Virginia. I also have to go to there. So, um, so I think 6 parks now that I still have to visit

Mary:

And 6 parks will close you out. How many total?

Gary:

Well, there are 63 National Parks proper, but I'm also working on visiting all the National Park Service sites, of which there are 428, and I've been to about half of those. So that includes all the National Historic Sites, monuments, things like that.

Mary:

Oh, so you are very close to closing out on the National Parks. That's really exciting. Now what about the UNESCO World Heritage Sites, is that included in your quest?

Gary:

Yeah, I've been to over 400 UNESCO World Heritage sites, so that's about a third of all the ones globally. And, you know, whenever I'm in a place and there's one nearby, I just make it a point to go out of my way to go visit. And you could do a lot worse than just visiting UNESCO World Heritage Sites. There's a fair number that are obvious like the Pyramids and the Coliseum and stuff like that.

But then there's a lot far more that are places you've never heard of before that are parts of history that you're probably not familiar with. And the great part of visiting these sites is that it exposes you to these places that otherwise you may not know. A lot of people probably aren't aware that the largest city in North America prior to the arrival of Europeans was a place called Cahokia, which was right near the Mississippi River. In fact, it's pretty much across from St. Louis and about 50,000 people live there, and it's a World Heritage site.

One of the oldest settlements in the Americas that they found is Poverty Point in Louisiana, another World Heritage site. And there are these great places that are not very popular, but they're really some of the best places, I think, to visit once you know about them and know what they are.

Mary:

You mentioned that learning experience and knowing more about these places. What other ways does traveling with a goal like that deepen a traveler's experience?

Gary:

Like I said, it introduces you to new things that you otherwise wouldn't have done. Most people when they travel, especially since the dawn of smartphones, they go to places where they can take a picture of themselves that will impress their friends. The problem is, their friends are only going to be impressed if they see themselves in front of something that they know. So it has to be the Eiffel Tower or Big Ben or some other stereotypical iconic monument of a city.

And there's a reason why there are certain places that get a lot of likes on Instagram and people flock to those places because they're far more interested in showing other people that they've been there than they are in actually visiting themselves and learning something new.

And so it depends on the type of traveler you are. If you know impressing other people by your travels is what you're most concerned about, then by all means take selfies around the world (laugh). But if you actually want to go to learn and explore and better yourself, then I definitely think you need to go out of your way to find these places that a lot of people don't know about.

Mary:

Yeah, that's very interesting that you say that we do see a lot of those most popular places and, and even more so I think right now, there are a lot of travelers who are looking for a more unique experience. So helpful tip for them now. What fuels your passion for travel? Why is it important to you and to the world?

Gary:

Learning. That's the reason I did it, I've always had a passion for learning. And that's why I go to so many historic sites. That's why I do the podcast. Because there's a whole lot to the world beyond the things we know about. And I think that if you were to ask the average American to name a city in France other than Paris, they probably can't. But there's a whole lot of cities in Paris, a whole lot of towns that have a whole lot of history where a lot of amazing things happened. And the only way you can really learn about these things is by going and seeing it yourself.

There's only so much you can get out of a book. There's only so much you can get from watching a documentary to get a true visceral experience of many of these things. You have to go yourself and experience it.

Mary:

Well, it sounds like you've certainly experienced a whole lot in your travels. Very interesting, very exciting. Now, if you were to give 1 single most technology tool that every traveler should use, what would it be? Is it TripIt?

Gary:

I'm assuming that most people are going to have a smartphone now when they travel. So I would make sure that you have some sort of connectivity when you travel. That is more important than having all the great apps in the world. If you don't have an internet connection, they're of no use. The best company to work with as far as getting a cell phone package in the United States is T-Mobile for international travel. That allows you to basically not even have to think about it. You can land somewhere and you'll have internet connectivity. It may not be great, it may be slower than what you're used to, but it will work.

If you're going to land in some places, like let's say you're going to London, there are usually vending machines at airports like Heathrow where you can get a SIM card right on the spot for about £20 that will give you unlimited 5G data for a month roaming. Check to see what those options are before you travel. Because like I said, if you don't have connectivity, then all the greatest technology in the world won't really help you at all because pretty much everything is networked nowadays. And so that would be my advice. Make sure that you either have a plan that allows for international roaming or get a SIM card wherever you are on the ground.

Mary:

Thank you, Gary. And also for that connection to T-Mobile, I think we have a really great partnership with T-Mobile here at AAA, so I appreciate that.

Now I just want to thank you so much for your time today and for sharing your tips with us. We really do appreciate it. And we also want to thank our listeners for being with us daily. Wherever you get your podcast, folks, you should check out Gary's website, everythingeverywhere.com, and follow him on social media. And if you're planning a trip, be sure to connect with a AAA travel advisor, check out aaa.com/travel, or visit your local branch. And if you enjoyed this podcast, please subscribe. I'm Mary Herendeen. Thank you for traveling with AAA.