I’m very excited to have been approached by GPSmyCity and asked to contribute some of my travel posts to their app. What is a travel app? you might ask. And why bother to read blog posts through the app – and even pay for an upgrade – when you can just access them via the internet?

There are two major reasons for taking the app with you when you go away. Firstly, you can read downloaded articles offline and thus don’t need to use up data on your smartphone (especially useful if your provider doesn’t offer a good roaming deal abroad); you can access the downloaded articles when there is no mobile or internet connection available – e.g. on a plane, on the beach – or when reception is poor. Secondly, for any travel article downloaded on to your smartphone or tablet, you have the option to upgrade it by paying a small fee (US$1.99) to bind an offline city map and GPS navigation engine to the article and be given detailed directions that follow routes in the article and take you to all sites and places mentioned. When you want to try out a recommended restaurant, the app will take you there; if you want to visit an interesting cultural or historical site mentioned in the article, it will show you how to get there; or it will take you to a beach or on a walk that the article describes. And remember, the great thing is, this will all be available offline – no searching for that elusive mobile connection or worrying about the cost. You will be able to relax and lose yourself in the city you’re visiting without getting lost because the app will always be there to tell you where you are and show you how to get to where you want to be.

GPSmyCity has been publishing city guide apps on iTunes App Store since 2009 and Google Play since 2013. It’s the largest publisher of self-guided walking tour apps on iTunes App Store and Google Play with over 5,000 city walks in more than 600 cities across the world. It’s been recommended in publications such as the Telegraph, New York Times and Travel Weekly.

You can get the app for free and download travel articles about the city you’re visiting for free. But if you’re spending a good amount of time in the city and want to get the most out of your visit, then for a small fee you can upgrade to get the GPS link and be ‘taken around’. No more getting lost, no more wasting time trying to find that little bar or fantastic restaurant you read about, no more trying to remember what you read about a particular site of interest. The app will guide you and always be at your side as your personal guide.

To download the GPSmyCity app on to your phone or tablet, click on the banner in the right-hand column of this blog: ‘Inspiring Travel Articles – Take My Articles With You’, or go to the iTunes App Store by clicking here. So that you can get the true travel app experience and see all the benefits first hand, GPSmyCity are – for the first week of the launch of my articles – offering downloads of the following ones for free:

A Weekend in Vienna

Five Night in Nice – Eat, Drink, Do

The Traveller in Amsterdam

To get your free upgrade, just click on the link(s) above and you’ll be guided through the download.

There are 10 other articles of mine on the app (not included in the free giveaway this week): Travel Gourmet’s Favourite Places in Richmond & Twickenham; A Morning Walk in Kew Gardens; The Rialto Area of Venice; Lunch at Locanda Cipriani, Torcello; Breakfast in the Market Place & Cezanne’s Studio; Art & Food in Aix-en-Provence; 48 Hours in San Sebastian; 24 Hours in Bilbao; Lunch at Osteria Francescana (Modena); and My Favourite Things in London’s Covent Garden. I hope there will be more posts to come as I continue my travels; my next stop is Turin at the end of the month, so I’m looking forward to writing about my stay there.

I really hope you’ll give GPSmyCity a try – and remember, you can download the app and articles for free. You only pay if you want the personalised GPS guide and city map. So next time you’re heading to a new city – on holiday or even just a day or weekend trip in your own country – why don’t you try it? Or see what it has to say about where you live – you’ll most likely discover things about your own local city you never knew about before.

Many thanks to GPSmyCity for sharing some of my travel posts and offering the three articles on Vienna, Nice and Amsterdam for free this week.

And please share this post with anyone you know who might be interested!