We recently took along the Gypsy audio trip thru both of these parks. We downloaded prior to our visit. There was no cell service or internet at the park. The narrator was always with us. A map was included to follow along, but we chose only to listen to the narrator. We just activated the audio as we came close to the park. The narrator started to tell us about the park, the history and made suggestions for photo op’s. The narrator told us when the pull off’s were coming up and what to expect. This audio trip made our adventure much more exciting. We didn’t miss a thing at the parks. If we chose not to stop, the narrator just knew and continued on the trip. I can’t say enough about these trips. We have used them before in Glasier and Yellowstone. We are presently working on Bryce and Zion. Most of all, my husband found the narrator quite amusing, not annoying. After all, he is with you quite awhile along the trip. We made sure our iPad was being charged as we drove and left it on all day. The narrator would come on and off as we approached areas of interest. We definately recommend and will continue to use when we travel to other areas. Just downloaded Grand Canyon. Gypsy, keep up the good work. Well appreciated.
First I want to say that we started out early in the morning hoping to beat the crowd. Although we thought most of the tour guidance on the app was good, all of the “have to” locations that the app suggested were completely full when we approached them. We later found that there were some other obtainable waterfalls that we not crowded that were not mentioned. So we ended up driving for hours and only stopped at 2 tourist stands to get banana bread and a treat. Ugggg, it was a really long day of just driving. I wish we had had a “heads up” that all the sights would be full and we would have cut our trip short. Also learning on the app the day of the trip that we needed tickets to the park 24 hours ahead of time was not helpful information. Last but not least, the history of the rulers was repetitive and was not what we wanted to listen to the whole way down the mountain. We thought the guide was giving directions to get down but instead gave an account of the rulers. Although I think this app is a great idea and had some great info going up, it missed some opportunities to see some sites that our guide book had mentioned. On the morning of we chose to forgo the guidebook info and solely use this app. We would use the guidebook next time. As I shared before, without opportunities to park and explore because of the crowdedness, we ended up with a very long day of driving.
We just got back from Maui and if you don’t get this app and keep it open while driving around you’re missing out on a huge part of your trip. First off, the narrator’s voice is so pleasant and soothing that anything he says sounds great. You look forward to him just talking about anything just to keep listening to him talk. The points of interest and tips for parking or other things were fabulous. It is so accurate you’d think he was in the car with you. He says look for a sign and you then see it. The stories of the history of Hawaii were great. I’ve been to Hawaii 6 times but now I have a really good idea of the history from the whaling days to now. How it became a state was also eye opening. Really interesting and easy to listen to and hearing it while driving was great. Road to Hana guided audio us a must. You can’t do it by following a book, sorry Maui Revealed, and I had that with me too. Best money you’ll spend on a driving audio guide. No joke. Just leave app open as you drive around audio will chime in every now and then. It changes a boring drive to a really amazing tour. I’m sure all the drives are great. We did Maui and it was amazing. Enjoy.
Took the classic road to Hana tour a couple days ago and we really enjoyed the narrator’s stories and history of Hawaii. The one gripe I had is that there is no way you could do all of his suggested stops with the suggested time limits and still make it to the seven pools and back before sundown! We left at 8 am and only took two of the non must-do turn offs and were careful about not spending too much time at our stops. The narrator gave timing updates throughout the trip and we lined up with what he described as “making good time”. We even skipped the black sand beach on the way there (had a 3-6 pm reservation). We also tended to drive well above the speed limit, more on par with what the locals were driving at as we felt comfortable around the sharp turns and narrow roads. We made it to the seven pools by 3. Done with the hikes (we were basically trail running) in an hour and a half or so. Got to the black sand beach at 5:55 and were denied entry. Sundown was 6:45 so we were driving in pitch black on the way back which was.. harrowing to say the least! Again, it’s a great app for the most part but the suggested times spent at each of the places are definitely off. You need to be very quick at your stops or even skip some of the must-dos to be out and back before sundown!
The best audio narrated GPS based touring App available
We first found the Yellowstone and Grand Teton tour the night before we were arriving in Yellowstone for a Yellowstone paid guided tour we had already paid for through the park. We had a miserable time on a crowded bus with a horrible commentator and a child that asked a bunch of questions so thankfully I had already downloaded the app and the Yellowstone Tour. We spent the next day basically redoing our tour using the app and it was hands down 100 better than what we paid a ridiculous amount for the paid tour in Yellowstone. Since that day, we have used several of the GuideAlong tours for Hawaii( all of them), Rocky Mountain National Park, Vermont Scenic Route 100 Byway Scenic tour of the covered bridges in Vermont, Mesa Verde National Park, Glacier National Park, Great Smoky Mountains, Sedona, Grand Canyon, and have more downloaded that are ready to use. I have reused the Hawaii, Yellowstone, Grand Tetons, and Glacier National Park and they worked again all flawlessly. The knowledge, the hidden gems you will discover along the way, and the advice given is better than any paid tour guide and you get to do it in the privacy of your own car. It’s your own private tour guide!
I’ve brought Dave (the voice of GuideAlong/GyPSy) along on a couple trips now and won’t do a road trip without him if I can help it. On the Road to Hana (which includes other parts of Maui also) he not only told us all the places to stop, where to park and the amazing history behind all of it, but also what to do or not do to be respectful of the locals and their culture. I love this because I really prefer to not be an a*hole tourist. We are just retuning from a road trip through Yellowstone and Grand Tetons and found that Dave knew more than the the local guides. Since he has a script, he’s not relying on memory and we get all the info instead of bits and pieces. And there’s so much info!! I loved all of it. I didn’t think my husband would want someone talking at him during the drive, but he appreciated it and didn’t mind when we got the same spiel going different directions on the same road (though you can skip it if you want). Plus, Dave has a sense of humor and a personality, which is nice. I’m definitely bringing Dave along when I go to Acadia later this year and all future trips. He knows it all without being obnoxious.
We had planned where to go for our 30 year anniversary, but really had no idea what all the “must sees” would be. We felt so lucky to find this app. It was wonderful. The narrator (who we named T.G. for tour guide😜) was very personable and witty and anything but annoying. His voice was pleasant and the knowledge he provided was invaluable. We would have missed so many things on this trip had we not used it. We used the guide for the Grand Tetons and Yellowstone and the one for our travel into South Dakota for the Black Hills, Crazy Horse, Mt Rushmore and the Badlands. We had dreamed about this trip and wanted to experience “all the things”. The tour guide provided so much insight and made the trip so fun. He comes on automatically when you get on route (doesn’t matter from which direction you start) and makes it very smooth. We told some other couples in our hotel about it and they used it and were delighted! They said it saved them $1,000 on actual tour guides, let them be on their own schedule, paid $9.99 for the app and loved it. Gypsy Guides has trips for several places, so go check it out! You’ll be sooo glad you did.
We downloaded Gypsy Guide when we went to Hawaii the 3rd time. So when we headed out on our western United States tour we downloaded the western bundle. We have done the northern half and now we are starting the southern portion. It is so easy and convenient. We looked into doing a Grand Canyon southern rim only to find out the cost us over $250 pp. the app starts right at our campground. It is a no brainer. The things you learn on the Gypsy guide (now called Guide Along) is priceless. I tell everyone to get it. While in South Dakota I recommend it to a home school mom traveling through and she immediately downloaded it and said it was the best history class she purchased. I wish they had more places. We RV across the country and really wish they had more - the History alone is worth it. While in the Smokey Mountains the park ranger said we would not be able to use ANY guide as there was no reception. I told her Guide Along was GPS but she was adamant it would not work. It worked wonderfully with more information than the pamphlet the ranger insisted I take. We are now doing the 5 national parks in Utah. So stoked!!!
I used to love this app, but the company is starting to sour. Some of their tours are absolutely fantastic, but they are growing to new tours that grossly miss the mark. Problems such as inaccurate info, lack of verbal guidance for points of interest, and all-around poor tours. Some of these low-standard tours are still being marketed and priced similar to the rest of their normal reasonable-standard GuideAlong tours. I’ve purchased a ton of tours with this company and when I wrote in to the company to address my concerns I was originally ignored then later dismissed, pushed away, and left stammering in surprise. Based on the morose defensiveness, I would guess the owners are fielding customer service, instead of a trained CS department. Regardless, their customer service is downright awful. The customer is not always right, but there are countless resources available online geared towards strategies and best practices to keep them happy anyways. Really basic stuff even, (like simply being nice and hospitable) but I just don’t think GA even remotely cares about that sort of thing, based on my interactions with them. This experience is a great case study in how to flip a previously huge fan of a product into a disenchanted customer falling out of love and seeking competitors of this brand. Every ongoing interaction with this company is worse than the previous.
Don’t know how we would have done Road to Hana without it...
First trip to Maui for my daughter’s 25th birthday. We heard horror stories about driving the Road to Hana. I was overwhelmed trying to figure out the sights and Mile marker numbers on a map and realized there would be no cell service on our trip. I read about this app online and was skeptical, but figured I could use all the help I could get. Reading review after review to “just get it” I purchased the full Maui tour. All I can say is JUST GET IT—don’t hesitate or think twice—this made driving the Road to Hana a breeze!! I literally pressed the “start driving” button and our narrator (we called him Joe) talked us through the entire trip! Suggesting when to get gas, food, which stops were coming up, which were worth it and which to skip. I honestly could not recommend it more highly!! We saw everything we wanted and more without having to fumble, turn around, get lost—it was literally a life saver. I enjoyed all the narrations and learned a lot about Maui. While driving, “Joe” was THE perfect co-pilot! Just get it!! You will not regret it! HIGHLY recommend!!
I first used this app while on a family trip to Grand Teton, Yellowstone, and Glacier. It was so good I’ve purchased the tour for every place available since. It used to be the GyPSy App and the narrator is the same. My most recent trip to the Sierra Nevadas we used the Lake Tahoe, Yosemite, and Sequoia and Kings Canyon tours. My 10 year old knocked the socks off the Yosemite ranger when she explained how the granite formations were formed based on what she learned from the tour during the car ride. My 10 and 13 year old daughters love listening to the tours too. (This is saying a lot because my 13 year old is too cool for everything.) After the Lake Tahoe tour, my 13 year old was excited to learn that there was another tour for our visit to Yosemite. The narration is a good balance of history, science, and pop culture while providing driving directions, worthwhile/prioritized hikes, views, and other destinations. You will get so much more out of your trip if you use these tours. I highly, highly recommend this app for your travel excursions particularly to the national Parks.
Really appreciated this app and recommend it to anyone who is exploring Yellowstone National Park! My husband and I really enjoyed the narration (we even had a nickname for the narrator and talked about him like he was the 3rd member of our party!), the recommended stops along the way made it a truly memorable trip and at points where there was no service, we would have been lost without it! This app was so great, I would have given it 5 starts BUT…I am so disappointed that the narration included little to absolutely nothing about the indigenous people who live(d) on the land that is now Yellowstone National Park. The narrator mentions people living here “before white/Europeans came…” but then nothing more on them?!?! Come on! Plenty was mentioned about the different wild life in the park, the explorers and US presidents who played a role in the foundation of the park (which I appreciated no doubt) but nothing about the true and original stewards of the gorgeous, breath taking land we were driving through? So disappointing. I hope the app’s content creators step their game up and do some legit research to include the history of more than just white men.
What a great find! We start our retirement trip west in May of 2021 and return home in September of 2021. Our plan was to visit the National Park west of the Rocky Mountain National Park. We had never took a road trip west and a family member told to check out the GyPSy App. We decided to purchase the Rocky Mountain trip. We were so Wowed we purchased many of the tours. However for some reason we didn’t purchase the Arches National Park tour. By the end of the day we were so overwhelmed and exhausted. It hindsight we were like kids in a toy store running around taking pictures and missing the details. From that on point the GyPSy guide was downloaded and ready to play though our truck radio. We saw and heard about gems we never would have known about. In October we decided to revisit Smoking Mountains National Park first thing we did was down loaded GyPSy guide. We saw and learned so much more this time at the park thank you GyPSy guide! Covid restrictions dampened our trip west but the GyPSy guide truly a created experience that we will never forget! Thank you, Katie and Brian Rumpilla
My family and I were road tripping through Arizona and decided to make a day of the Grand Canyon. I stumbled across this guided tour on Google and decided to spend the $12, because why not! I had done no preparation, and I was fairly sure we weren’t going to hike down this trip. We just needed some guidance to do a quick trip to the best scenic places. Well, thanks to GuideAlong’s EXCELLENT directions and suggestions, we happily spent nearly 6 hours at the Grand Canyon. What we enjoyed most were the back stories of each place - the timeline, the history, the geography, the people, the drama! Real life is so much better than fiction. All of it delivered by a narrator with a rich warm voice and just enough of a sense of humor. And I loved that there were vignettes from the time we left Williams and even after we left the Grand Canyon and headed back towards Flagstaff. It felt like the narrator was a super knowledgeable passenger riding along with us. I only wish that we knew his name! GuideAlong made our trip really fabulous. Even our cranky teenager was into it.
Gypsy Guide Road to Hana was AMAZING! It was foolproof. All you have to do is download it. (Make sure you do it in advance while you have internet.). And then start it up when you begin driving that day. Your guide pops in as you approach the beginning of your journey automatically and then talks every time you need him. He opens with tips, tricks and instructions on how the audio guide works and then continues to guide you thoughtfully throughout your entire trip. On a road that has a reputation for scaring the bejeezus out of many people, it felt like we had an actual guide right in the car with us telling us where to turn and what not to miss. It was a real confidence booster and despite many hairy turns, I really wasn’t scared. My new friend was with me and he knew exactly what to do and where to go. The trip never would have been as fulfilling (and educational too!) without it. I would use Gypsy Guide again and again. After spending 13 hours together today, and relying on him so much, is it weird that I miss him now?
I’ve used this app at 6 national parks now, its mostly good, some routes are better than others for sure. My main issue is how it handles updates, if your map is outdated you can’t use it until you update. If you’re out in Yellowstone NP, miles from service, you’re out of luck. That’s the main appeal of this app to me is that you can download it all ahead of time and use it offline. Anyway its gotten worse. On our most recent trip about half way through I just stopped trying to get it to update. Even though i updated everything on wifi before leaving for our trip and even though i checked for updates at least twice on the trip when at a visitor center or somewhere with wifi, it still quit to install updates it couldn’t download three separate times. So for those drives we couldn’t use the app we paid $15 for. Update: The dev contacted me to tell me that what happened to me in fact did not happen and that the app works great, which reminded me that their support is pretty bad. I’ve contacted them a few times with questions and they just tell me its working fine and I must be doing it wrong. Maybe I am, but it’d be nice if they would tell me how to do it right.
I don’t ever purchase these types of products because I figure I can look at a map and figure things out myself. And while that may be true, this app is 100% worth the money. I decided to purchase after seeing hundreds of people in the Yellowstone Facebook group say it is a must have. And they are not wrong. We purchased the “Northern National Park Loop” package. So far we have used Grand Teton and Yellowstone tours. The guide (who we’ve named Dave lol) tells us all of the spots that are absolute musts and some spots that are okay to pass up if we’re short on time. That is so helpful to us. It has been time saving. He tells us where to stop for iconic pictures, what animals to be searching for in what areas, etc. It’s truly like having you own personal tour guide in the car with you telling you all the things you would have never known if he wasn’t there. We’ve had the best trip and have seen amazing things we otherwise wouldn’t have without his advice. This app is an absolute must have. You won’t regret purchasing.
This was our first purchase, Arches and Canyonlands National Parks. So glad we did it. As we drove, the narrator, guided us through the parks with just enough information to remind us of upcoming turn off’s, and sometimes alert us to little known spots we could visit. It was not a constant ramble, but just as if they were in the car with us and making observations as we drove. Also, giving the background of how formations got their name and historical context, as well as some geology lessons. The suggestions as we drove for either short hikes or long hikes was excellent. Especially as the day wore on and we wore out! Knowing that we could go to a viewpoint to see delicate arch, or take the hike, which would take approximately two hours was great to know and helped make our decision. As we travel around the country, I will always be looking to see if Gypsy Guide has a tour of the area we are going through. We drove from Arizona to Arches NP and as we went through Monument Valley on our way I did wish there was a Gypsyguide in that area.
I bought this tour when I decided to go to Yosemite last year, and I’m so happy that I did, this is NOT your normal tour where you just get some information about the attractions and the hot spots but it’s much more. This is a great tour where it will tell you your options for the turns to make ahead of time so you can change your lanes while you can safely. It will tell you ahead of time of where you’re heading if you keep straight or take a turn. It will talk about the geology, the history and fun facts about the places you’re visiting. It works seamlessly with Bluetooth or Apple car play while your music is on. If you’re driving faster than the speed limit and you passed the point on the map it will just catch up with you by skipping that point and talk about the coming one UNLIKE the other tours where they just get hung up and confused. I LOVE this tour guide I just finished the Las Vegas tour which was great and I bought many of the tours that this company is offering for my upcoming road trips.
We purchased the app for the road to Hana in Maui. It was really quite wonderful to hear the guide, with a great DJ voice, explain to us where we need to go and what to do. The guide is synced with the phone’s GPS, so it even says things like “take the next curve to the left, and then you’ll see the entrance sign on the right. Park in the first available space.“ We haven’t been able to compare this with similar guides, so I don’t know if the “must see” attractions on this app are the same as what other apps and guide books or travel websites might say. The single biggest issue is that between the commentary, the app picks random audio tracks from my phone. This resulted in a very weird journey, including an hour and a half long boring lecture I had downloaded several years ago, and there was no way that I could find to skip the track or to identify a tracklist or at least musical genre to use as background music. In my opinion, this feature desperately needs to be fixed.
Made the mistake of purchasing through Viator and TripAdvisor initially (where I found out about it), and couldn’t access my purchase. After buying directly through the app, it was easy and great! So glad I found this app, my whole family loved the helpful descriptions that give a heads up on points of interest and where not to miss a turn or turn off to catch them! A lot of the stories, history, background on our route were pretty interesting. All in all, a very worthwhile purchase that I would recommend! Just wish the map parts for our real time driving routes were better. When you zoom in, the too tiny print details disappear. Highways and road names on the tour route aren’t labeled. I had to keep comparing with different maps and guessing where we might need to go compared to the app’s pictured route, and even took a snapshot so I could enlarge the print on their map picture as a photo on my phone. (The route descriptions are helpful to a certain point, but not detailed enough to figure out some of the driving route specifics.)
We liked learning about the history of Hawaii and the stops on the Road to Hana, but were disappointed with the fact that all the “must see” stops were given the same weight, and other stops were not sufficiently explained in terms of whether there was a fee for entry or whether a future stop would sufficiently cover the material from a prior stop (for example, neither Twin Falls nor The Garden of Eden were worth the cost). Oheo Gulch and Wai’anapapana State Park were both incredible and I wish there were an option that recommended going there first and spending a significant chunk of the day there. Essentially we should have done more of our own research but instead relied on Gypsy Guide and it was not sufficient to produce the experience we were seeking. Also, the timetable seems unrealistic — we were in Paia by 7am and still didn’t get back to Paia until 7pm, even skipping most stops. I don’t understand how Gypsy recommends all the stops it does and still expects people to turn around by 4:30pm. We liked the information we received but it just didn’t seem enough to make informed decisions about our journey.
We really enjoyed this app and the way that they help you navigate the details of Road to Hana. “Frank” (as we’ve decided to name the voice) did good with highlights, what to miss, where to make sure to stop and even basic directions or “watch out for this turn”. We really enjoyed the Hawaiian history lesson on the return journey. My only feedback is to provide some of the logistics on the app prior to leaving. (Start at this location at X time - which was said, these stops will take X minutes, here’s when to turn around if you don’t like to drive in the dark. Frank said all of this, but when we were on the journey. For us OCD Planners, I would have liked to read this once I purchased the content. I have no idea how anyone is supposed to hit all of the stops in any kind of decent timing. That’s not a GuideAlong issue, but maybe they could provide better guidance on “Route A is 6 hours” and “Route B is 10 hours” and people can choose? Just an idea.
I purchased the full Maui experience app after recommendation from a friend. We used it not only for our Road To Hana trip, but for our regular drives throughout Maui including Haleakala and Iao Valley. The narrator was very easy to listen to and so interesting that our kids actually enjoyed it. He kind of sounded like Tom Selleck. Every time we got back in the car, they would ask did you turn on the app. We loved the stories about the history of Hawaii, especially on the drive back from Hana. We had a great experience with our drive to Hana unlike some others. We lucked out with our stops starting out really early in order to get to our reservation at Waianapana Park. None of our stops were very crowded-the only issue was many places early on were closed since we did start so early. I will be using this app now for other trips to National Parks around the US or any major cities this app is available for. It was well worth the $20!!
I first used this app when traveling through Yellowstone and the Grand Canyon and loved it. When I was going to Hawaii this year, I made sure to get it for the Big Island. At first, my 21-year-old daughter wasn’t sure about using the app, probably thinking it would only be interesting to those in the middle age bracket. After a few days, she admitted she enjoyed the app & made sure it was turned on when we went for a drive. This app told us about the Hawaiian culture, landscape and areas of interest that we wouldn’t have known otherwise. I’ll definitely use this app again when I travel. We weren’t sure what the guy’s name was who narrates the app. He has a calm steady voice so I called him Bob (after Bob Newhart). My daughter didn’t know who this was so she called him Fred. His voice becomes so familiar it’s like having him on the trip. I’ll have to look up his real name next time I use the app. Thanks Bob or Fred or whoever you are for making our trip more enjoyable!
We used this app when it was GyPSy Guide for touring Yellowstone, O’ahu and Maui and it was incredible, just like have a fully knowledgeable tour guide sitting next to me telling me where to turn, what to see, what to skip and providing historical, geological and geothermal facts about the areas. The level of detail, accuracy and completeness was amazing. The app was the best money we spent on those vacations. We tell everyone that they must get the app when traveling those areas. When we planned our recent trip of the Grand Circle of National Parks in Utah and Arizona, we again turned to Guide Along (the new name for GyPSy Guide). Once again, it was incredible and so very helpful and informative. It guided us thru Zion, Bryce Canyon, Capital Reef, Arches, Canyonlands and Grand Canyon National parks. There were a number of very interesting stops we would have missed were it not for the app. We would not tour any of the areas covered by Guide Along without getting and using the app. It is amazing!
I cannot praise this app enough. We decided in April to go to Yellowstone - spur of the moment. I started my research which was overwhelming and was a little worried about organizing our time in the park. I kept hearing about the GuideAlong app on the Facebook groups I was visiting. A day before we left my finger hovered above the buy button in the App Store. Thankfully I hit buy now. It was a game changer. From the moment we entered the park, the app took over and guided us to all the must see spots and many extra stops we wouldn’t have known to make. I cannot thank the developers of this app enough. It made a huge difference in the success of our trip and we plan to use it on future trips. Before we left Bozeman we were telling a newly arrived group of Yellowstone newbies about the app and ended up helping them download it. I will be posting on Facebook as well. Thank you for making our trip such a success. I truly believe your app made the difference.
I downloaded this app prior to our trip to Yellowstone. It came highly recommended by multiple people on a Facebook page I was following as I planned our trip. This is well worth it!! I was overwhelmed looking at all the possibilities of the various places to see and do, but the guides voice was pleasant to listen to and he provided suggestions and area knowledge during our drive through the park. This guide made it easy to see many of the must have stops as well some of the less but highly recommended stops. When you’d stop, you’d already have some basic knowledge of what was in store which was another bonus. At times, I felt like I had a smart, knowledgeable GPS with me especially when I came to areas of either taking a left or a right. The guide provided information for both directions. The accuracy of knowing where you are in the park is amazing! Get the app and download the tour, you won’t regret it!!
I purchased the Black Hills/Rushmore/Badlands/Spearfish Loop tour package after a recommendation from a friend. When my teens heard I had purchased an audio tour, they laughed at me, but, after just the first tour, they were converts! We enjoyed the interesting facts and stories. As someone who had never been to this area before, following the included tour routes was a huge blessing as we saw the main highlights but also were pointed to some lesser known spots (like the spot where they filmed the final scene of Dances with Wolves and the historic fish hatchery, which is way cooler than it sounds). The tour gives very clear directions which was another huge blessing as the driver got to enjoy the tour as well without trying to figure out how to get to the next spot. Definitely follow the guide’s recommendation of which direction to drive to Mount Rushmore through Custer State Park for it makes for an amazing drive. I highly recommend GyPSy Guide, as do my teens.
My husband and I took a road trip through the Midwest that we barely planned out. We ended up at Yellowstone without any prior knowledge of the park or experience with visiting national parks. By chance we came across this app while trying to figure things out in a magazine, and it was the best decision we made. The tour follows where you are in the park and knows when to give you the needed information. It tells you about the park’s history, it teaches you the science required in order to understand the features in the area, it gives you anecdotes, it recommends hidden gems, it helps you navigate this huge park! It was amazing. I’ve never actually written a review before, but I felt inclined to for this one because I hoped that everyone who was visiting the park could also enjoy it. I definitely plan to check it frequently to see what other tours they add, as we were very happy with it this time around.
This app is AWESOME!! We usually ride the hop on hop off buses when we go to most big cities. This time, in Honolulu we rented a car and downloaded this app to see how it worked. Started the trip and was amazed at how detailed the tour is. Tons of good local information and facts and unbelievably easy to follow driving instructions. I wish all GPS could be this clear. The tour guide speaking is triggered by GPS points on the map as well so it’s super easy to follow. The self guided tour allowed us to stop as often as we liked and spend as little or as much time as we wanted in each location (without waiting for a bus to come back). I can’t say enough good things about this app. It’s genius!! We take several big trips a year and I will be looking for this where ever we go to see if it’s available. I also get to keep my downloaded tours forever so I can use them everyday of my trip and if I ever come back.
Had this app recommended before our trip to yellowstone. Bought the tour more as this is probably hokey and the kids are going to roll their eyes but let’s give it a shot. First it works on gps so we didn’t need cell service. We found it worked best to have it going on one phone that we left plugged in the car and take the our other phone for pics. Also beware if you come across animals when the windows are down as the points of interests just start playing when you hit that location. We had 5 kids age 8-15 with us. My 15 year old told us he learned more from the guide than he did his science teacher. If I accidentally clicked out of the app, the kids would remind me to start the guide back up. We learned more this trip than any other trip to Yellowstone. I can’t recommend it enough! We will definitely be buying more tours!
I admit we did almost zero preparation for our 1 day trip to Yellowstone’s lower loop. We would have missed so much without this app. The narrator (I wish I knew who it was because he sounded familiar) was easy to listen to and had lots of little tidbits about the park. I was scared he’d be annoying but he wasn’t! I wasn’t fully confident that the tour would load since cell service is very limited in the park (AT &T is our carrier but we were told that Verizon has much better coverage there), but as we followed the map, the narrator would magically start speaking when we hit the arrows on the map. There were a couple of times the app felt a little glitchy like when we resumed from a stop, but it always worked out. We also had a couple of moments where we weren’t 100% sure we were doing what was suggested. Yellowstone did not disappoint and neither did this app. Well done, Gypsy tour!
We have been using these guides for years and we highly recommend them to anyone who will listen. The level of detail and extent covered in this guide is unmatched. We particularly appreciate the additional information provided on where to park, stop for treats, must-visit sites and hikes, and cautionary advice for dangerous areas. We love the flexibility of being able to travel at our own pace and in the privacy of our vehicle. The map overview, tips, highlights, and the ability to start and stop the tour as we please are also great features. It's like having an entertaining and knowledgeable historian, geologist, ecologist, and expert tour guide all rolled into one. Our entire family, including the teens, thoroughly enjoys listening and learning from these tours. It's an extraordinary value for what is received, and we never travel without our guide. It's an absolute must-have for any traveler!
Raging fan here!!!! In Maui on vacation and decided to do the Road to Hana. Spent numerous hours researching stops to hit and trying to make sure we had all the directions needed. That was a complete waste of time. I just happened to come across GypsyGuide and downloaded the Maui Tour. Absolutely phenomenal!!! There is little to no cell service on the tour so having all the directions and audio offline was amazing. Everything was on point and truly made us feel like there was a tour director along for the ride. Do yourself a favor and purchase the entire Maui tour. There is so much more included and the narrator gives you the history of Hawaii and other information as you drive around the Island. This will be our go to app when ever we travel. I just can’t say enough about how great this was. We would have missed so much on the journey both in stops and information!!!!
We LOVE Guide Along! We love all the humor, history, geological, and interesting local stories following each of your tours. We just finished the Blue Ridge parkway tour, and I want to thank you for mentioning one particular point of interest that we hadn’t realized. I knew the story of the Bedford Boys from WWII, but didn’t realize how close to Bedford VA we were! As we were driving south on the BRP, he started talking about them, and mentioned the D-Day WWII memorial. We decided it was worth the 9 mile side trip and what a wonderful surprise! First of all it’s very large, absolutely gorgeous, and so well thought out! It honors everyone who served in the Overlord campaign. It was truly amazing and someplace that everyone should visit once in their lifetime! Thanks Guide Along for giving us not only for great information along the actual route but also for so much extra information in the areas off your tours!
I admittedly didn’t have high hopes for a drive along tour app. Kinda thought it would be something some kid pieced together in his basement to make a quick buck. But I was wrong. This app is great, both in terms of content and technology. Info was really good, informative, and read by a dead ringer (vocally) for Jim Gaffigan. I kept waiting for hot pocket jokes. Technically, I really appreciated how you’d get different info relative to if you were driving north or south on the same road. It wasn’t just a rerun. The timing was perfect such that you’d see what Jim was taking about at just the right time (assuming you go the speed limit). Longer audio clips about more general things would play when it was obvious there was no interesting things to see during that section of a drive. It was all timed, paced, and organized perfectly. Now I just wish they had more locations as I’m sold.
I was so worried I would miss something and spent weeks mapping out our vacation, I joined online forums, Facebook pages, and purchased maps of Grand Tetons and Yellowstone, I was making sure I seen everything. However, I purchased this app and we used it in both parks and man there were so many things I had missed that the app told us about and we learned so much history on both parks from this app, it truly was an excellent purchase and worth every penny! The voice tone and speed is perfect and again so much history, knowledge, and passion was put in to creating this app and you can hear and feel it every time he speaks. Definitely do not go without it! We will be purchasing it for any place we visit in the future if there is a series available for that location, thank you for helping us see what we would have missed without you!
We used GyPSy Guide on a recent road trip through Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Park and it was great! Both of my kids (6 and 9) really enjoyed the facts, narration, and information that the app provided (and were a little sad that we didn't have it for the rest of our trip outside of the park). The audio was clear, easy to understand, and extremely well timed to trigger at the right time and complete before the next announcement. We drop the park several days in different directions and the audio prompts changed depending on our direction (with some repeats, which was to be expected). The app worked fine with Music and Google Maps playing in the background in Apple Car Play. I would highly recommend this for anyone driving through a National Park - it was great! I can't wait to visit another park that it has audio available for!
This is one of the best app purchases I’ve ever made and can’t express enough how well it work. I didn’t even know GPS based audio tour apps existed. After an article mentioned it while preparing for a trip to the Badlands, Black Hills, and Mount Rushmore, I downloaded at the at the last minute. It made the vacation so much better. It made navigating a breeze and so much less stressful for the driver/navigator. We would have missed out on a lot of little side excursions and so much history. Our 8 and 5 year seemed to like it to listening along and commenting. We didn’t even need to look at GPS map the entire time. The narrator was spot on where to turn. I love how you could “choose your own adventure” and get out at an optional side excursion and the narrator would pick up right where you left off. I will definitely use it for our next national park vacation!
Just got back from Yellowstone/grand Tetons. This app was the star of the show. With no cellphone signal you either preplan every single stop on your way and plot your path on an offline map or just take your chances possibly missing important stops co you just didn’t realize what’s there (for example the fairytale trail leading to the spectacular must see a vermillion over the prismatic spring) This app delivers it all offline. With a map and GPS tracker you know you won’t lose your way. And with heads up commentary about each possible stop you get to make up your mind where to stop and when to skip. Having the app is not an excuse though to skip pre planning for your visit, but with minimum planning this app can be a huge asset. Even with a detailed pre plan the app will extremely enhance the experience. I will be looking for guides from gypsy guides for my next trips!
Before beginning our RV travel lifestyle. I downloaded GyPSy. Loved it! Then the name changed to GuideAlong. I prefer GyPSy but when I tell people, you must get this app. I say GuideAlong as in Tour Guide comes Along with you. I have referred so many people to this app. They love it as much as I do. I call my app Gus. This has completely changed prepping for a park. Open Gus to look at itinerary, now I know how many days in the park I need. Then I look at the map. Where do I need to stay to enter the park. Once in the park, Gus is in charge. I love the history and back ground he explains. His explanation when there is a choice in direction to take. Turns are left or right not east or west. He has more stories for the return trip out of the park. He tells us to stop as we drive thru or to drive all the way then make stops on the return trip. I have used him on your busses! His is Amazing!! You must get GuideAlong!
We just returned from a one week, road trip through the Grand Canyon, Arches National Park, Canyonlands National Park, and Bryce Canyon National Park. We are so glad we made the investment for the Gypsyguide app and tours. It was like having a tour guide, geologist, historian, biographer, and comedian riding along in the backseat. The driving guide and recommendations really assisted us in our travels. We did not have time to see everything, and we found the Gypsyguide’s recommendations to be very helpful. We really enjoyed learning about the parks and their history. We also really appreciated how it interacted with the GPS and told us where to turn and when. Once we went through the entrance gate into a national park prior to it opening. Since we did not get a park map, the Gypsyguide saved the day. We look forward to our next road trip with the GyPSy Guide. If you enjoy road trips, you will love this app. Highly recommend.
We purchased the Utah Mighty 5 tour bundle based on the recommendation of a friend. This app is Awesome!!!!!! Our whole family listened intently to everything our guide said on the tours. It was like having a personal NPS Ranger in the car. We learned so much more while driving and listening to the guide - far more than just stopping to read every sign. Even the drives between Zion and Bryce Canyon were entertaining as well as the drove from Canyonlands to Arches and Moab (and vice-versa). Make sure you download the data while in cell coverage as most of the parks do not have data service. Highly recommend!!!!!!! Will purchase tours for future road trips! My only comment for improvement is the Bryce portion needs to be updated to reflect a new traffic circle at the Highway turnoff from the main Highway into Bryce Canyon City. The next summer we purchased the Hawaii bundle and loving it!
This is literally like having a personal tour guide in the comfort of your own car. After driving some 10 uneventful, flat hours to get to South Dakota, we were more than happy to have this narration. The narrator is beyond helpful and made the journey really fun. The Badlands are beautiful, but after a while, it gets a bit same-y. This narration made the Badlands, and Rushmore, and other South Dakota points of interest, come alive. We have traveled all over this country and world, and hands down, my favorite trip was South Dakota because of this app. My second favorite trip was NW Washington state and this app was the reason. You won’t understand the hoopla untill you listen for yourself. This app pays for itself in terms of knowledge, guidance, and entertainment for the entire family. I only wish there were more options! Hopefully they are working on that.
I cannot say enough awesome things about this app. It has changed so many of our family trips for the better, and we even plan our trips around available audio tours now (on our last trip to Smoky Mountains, we decided to add on Blue Ridge Parkway because of GuideAlong). Our entire family (including teenagers!) loves the audio tours. We learn so much more than we would trying to read about these places in a guidebook, and our kids actually pay attention and engaged on long road trips. We’ve now purchased Grand Tetons and Yellowstone, Utah Mighty Five, Smoky Mountains, Blue Ridge Parkway, Acadia, and more. My kids refer to the narrator as “Sir Appleton Gypsy” (they came up with that during our first tour when the App was GyPSy Guide) and share facts by starting “Sir Appleton said…” I can’t wait to use this on our future road trips and highly highly recommend it.
We recently downloaded and used the GyPSy guides for Badlands NP and Custer State Park / Mt. Rushmore as well as for Grand Teton and Yellowstone NPs. They are excellent! Full of all kinds of information on the history, geology and scenery of each region, all delivered in a friendly, easy to listen to narration that we really enjoyed. The gps triggering worked perfectly and precisely wherever we were. Really made our road trip so much richer and easier (especially for Badlands, where the temperature was 107 degrees and we were not inclined to do much hiking). Regrettably, we had only one day at Yellowstone but the GyPSy guide helped us get the most out of it. It’s like having your very knowledgeable and good-natured favorite uncle in the car. In fact, we missed our well-informed companion later in the trip when driving through parks for which GyPSy tours are not (yet!) available. Highly recommend!
We use this app for our great Smoky Mountains trip in September 2021. I found this on the Apple App Store and thought it would be pretty cool to have a self narrated tour of wherever we went little did we know it was very in-depth. It came with so much information which was really interesting to know and it was very informative as we drove up and down the mountain it would give us information going up and different information and going down it was really fun. I found those and told my wife about it who is normally the super nerdy one. She was very happy to see this working really well we had no cell phone coverage in the mountains no data but ours narrator was with us the entire time I’m not really sure how that works but it was phenomenal. This was just a great app and well worth the cost to purchase if only we lived closer to the other road trips.
Don’t go to Yellowstone without “Gary” (who we found out is actually named Mark but will always be Gary to our group.)We had 8 people, teens and parents in two cars. This app was fantastic for all ages! Info is excellent, what to see, what to skip, about what you’re seeing… educational and funny! We never would have seen the steamboat geyser if it had not been for “Gary.” Traffic was terrible because it was actually erupting (which it does rarely and on no particular schedule.) We would have said, “forget it” due to the traffic but it was a must see area and we caught it along with several other great things by taking “Gary’s” advice. Can’t wait to visit another location that we can use this app for! We told everyone we met at the park to get it! Soooo worth the money, in fact, worth much more! A ton of work went into this one tour! We are incredibly impressed and thankful.
Utah’s Mighty Five and Rocky Mountain National Park
My wife and I just got back from touring Utah’s Mighty 5 and Rocky Mountain National Park. The audio tours from Guide Along guided us through each park and they were fantastic. We valued them so much , we were disappointed there wasn’t a tour for scenic highway 12 from Capitol Reef to Canyonlands National park, so we bought an audio tour from another vendor for that part of the trip. It was no where near as good. When we got to Canyonlands, we couldn’t wait to put “our dude” back on to get us to what we should see and give us great info on what we were encountering. One valuable pointer if you have the time on your trips: take the side trips that are mentioned; they all turned out fantastic and were the highlights of our trip in each area. If there’s an audio tour from Guide Along for an area we’re going to going forward, we’re going to get it.
Upgrade your road trip adventures with our location-based audio tours. It’s just like having a tour guide in your car™. HOW IT WORKS We’ll guide you to the all the best things to see and do, and suggest side-trips and local tips, so you don’t miss a thing. Listen to fun and informative stories about the history, geology, hikes, animals, local peoples and highlights along the routes. Commentary plays automatically as you drive, based on your location and direction. You have the freedom to travel at your own pace. Tour offline with GPS. No need for cell service or WiFi signal while touring. Everything is downloaded to your device for easy, offline use. Visit our website www.GuideAlong.com to see a complete list of tour route maps, sample commentary, more travel tips & suggested itineraries. KEY FEATURES - Autoplays as you drive, based on your location and direction - Works offline with GPS, no cellular service, WiFi signal or data required while touring - Play your own music in background - Listen to commentary before and after you travel Trip Planning Suggested Itineraries Highlights Travel Tips TOURS (we keep adding more tours!) Bundles of tour available and offer great value US HAWAII Maui including Road to Hana Oahu Kauai Big Island, Hawaii Acadia National Park Arches and Canyonlands National Parks Beartooth Highway Big Sur PCH Hwy1 Black Hills, Mount Rushmore and Badlands National Park Blue Ridge Parkway Bryce Canyon & Zion National Park Capitol Reef National Park Catskills Scenic Byway Death Valley Glacier National Park including Many Glacier Grand Canyon National Park South Rim Great Smoky Mountains National Park Joshua Tree National Park Kancamagus Scenic Byway Keweenaw - Copper Country Kings Canyon National Park Lake Tahoe Lake Superior North Shore Hwy 61 Las Vegas - Grand Canyon West, Hoover Dam & Red Rock Canyon Mesa Verde National Park Miami, Key West & The Florida Keys Michigan Lakeshore M22 & Sleeping Bear Dunes Olympic National Park Oregon Coast Outer Banks Rocky Mountain National Park, Colorado Sedona Sequoia National Park Vermont Scenic Byway 100 Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks Yosemite National Park Zion & Bryce Canyon National Park CANADA Canadian Rockies National Parks Banff, Lake Louise, Moraine Lake & Yoho National Park Icefields Parkway Jasper Drumheller Waterton National Park and Alberta Southwest Vancouver Whistler Niagara Falls AUSTRALIA Great Ocean Road PRICING Each tour is a one time purchase. No time limits. Use as many times as you like. No monthly subscription. REVIEWS “PERFECT! We would have missed or skipped SO much! DON’T HESITATE and make the purchase ASAP!!” “Personal Tour - Worth more than every $” “This app was amazing for us. We saw so much more than we would have without it.” “Great Value I was leery about purchasing the app. Boy was I wrong.” NOTES Using location service GPS increases battery usage - we highly recommend taking DC car charger versus simply plugging into the vehicle’s USB port
