Not all travel comes down to booking the cheapest flight to a specific destination. Maybe you got a windfall and are looking to spend it on a trip, or you plan a family vacation every year. When the location is open, a new iPad app by Amadeus may be the ticket. Travel Seeker HD starts with your airfare budget and offers every destination within your price range, as well as the best time to buy.
When you open Travel Seeker, you'll see a map of the world with your location marked by a red pin based on GPS data from your iPad. Use the budget button at the top to provide a limit as to how much you want to spend on airfare. Pins will show up marking all of the destinations within your budget. Color corresponds with value — green means a good deal, red means the ticket is pricey.
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But the makers of the app also understand that there's more to travel than money. Travel Seeker includes filters that let you narrow destinations to those that include a beach, ski resort or theme park. It displays a year's worth of weather data , including average temperatures, expected rainfall and wind conditions. Travelers can also connect with Facebook, which then adds Facebook flags to the map to see where friends are located.
You'll be able to compare specific flights, but you can't book them on Travel Seeker. Amadeus serves the travel industry, so the app is designed to make it easy for you to email flight details to your travel agent for booking. However, you can just as easily use the information from Travel Seeker to book the flight yourself through an app such as Kayak or Travelocity, two of the most popular free apps in the App Store.
TravelSeeker HD delivers information in English for more than 150 U.S. destinations and 350 international destinations and can be downloaded for free in the App Store.