It's 4 weeks before we fly to Athens for a two week holiday around the Western Cycladic Islands. I've decided to blog the trip and have been looking at a variety of apps to make this as painless as possible.
Technology has moved on massively over the last few years. When I first started my 1001 Nights blog I tried a variety of different ways to blog whilst on the go. The first time I used a small digital voice recorder in conjunction with a netbook - recording ideas and thoughts as I went along and at the end of the day I'd write up the blog. All well and good in theory but firstly, I felt a bit of a fool talking into a voice recorder and then secondly, once I fell behind on typing up the blog it all went to pot. I felt under such pressure to keep on top of the blogging that it began to get in the way of enjoying the trip. In the end I resorted to ditching the netbook and just scribbling notes on paper that were written up when I came home.
In between visits I decided to purchase some expensive software - the latest version of Dragon Naturally Speaking. Although it worked brilliantly at converting speech to text (I could even train it to recognise Egyptian names and places) it took up a lot of memory and would only work on my laptop - not the netbook. So after investing in the software I felt obliged to lug the laptop over to Egypt on our next visit. It was great not having to type up the notes each evening but again I had to use it conjunction with some hand written notes (and a lot of reliance on my memory). There was still an element of inconvenience in using this method. The laptop was heavy and because of this I'd do the blogging last thing at night - as an early bird this isn't when I function the best!
So in the meantime Posterous, the site where my blog was originally hosted closed down. The 1001 Nights blog has now been exported to Posthaven but this site is still under development. A simple way to blog (but is reliant on a good internet connection) is to blog straight into the blog page by using the Siri dictation tool on the iphone. However, after doing a big more research into various iphone apps I've discovered Evernote!
Evernote is brilliant. It is especially brilliant for travel blogging. I'm still learning about all of the functionality of this nifty little tool but already it has saved me a kilo or so of luggage weight.
The first thing about Evernote which is brilliant is the web clipper tool. This has enabled me to find useful websites that have handy information such as ferry timetables, Athens travel info and recommended hotels when we get back to Athens. I had also downloaded a number of Greek Island guides in PDF format which I was going to print out - now there is no need - webclipper has taken the documents from the websites and uploaded them into Evernote.
I have Evernote on my iphone, my tablet and my laptop. I find it easier to use web clipper on the laptop but most of the information I need I can get before I travel so this isn't a problem. I suspect that I will be using my iphone to do most of the blogging. It doesn't matter if it's quite rough because it can be tidied up when I get home. However, I will be able to write notes or dictate notes (Siri comes into it's own on the iphone 5) on the go, take photos and share postings very easily.
Some of Evernote's other compatible tools are Evernote Food and Skitch - check these out on the Evernote website. I'm really impressed and can't wait to put all of these apps to the test in Greece!