The
iPhone Apps Napa Tour Guides Use
As I travel around I show other tour guides our iPhone Apps
for Napa and Sonoma. We’ll be waiting for our collective clients while I show
them the features. They love that the directory can be sorted by attractions. They
appreciate that the photo gallery of wineries and restaurants include pictures
of their signs. Its tricky spotting places when the sign designs vary so much.
For instance, you wouldn’t know that Far Niente had a sign if you didn’t know
what to look for.
The guides especially like phone dialing directly from the
App. When you’re driving with your clients and have to see if a winery has an
appointment open ‘now’, you just touch the screen to talk with their tasting
room. Cool! While the feature connecting to their website is helpful, it’s not
something guides use on the fly. They depend on our directory text, written by
tour guides who have been there.
What doesn’t the directory do? Parrot the language of the publicists!
If you read winery websites every place is a paragon of the wine makers art, an
Olympian ideal of what the grape was intended to create. The staff was raised
in special camps where they learned everything they needed to know to produce
the most wonderful tasting room experience. This is wine country; people drink
a lot and love to lie for the sake of a good story. Sometimes they stretch the
truth up and sometimes down. I don’t begrudge them that talent, but we have our
own opinion of the wineries, and that’s what goes into our books and Apps.
Keep in mind that we have three advantages; hearing our
client’s impressions, visiting 1000’s of wineries, and, often times, being the
only sober people there. That’s why we ask other guides their opinions; they’ll
tell us the inside story.
The favorite features may be the wine lists, hours and
tasting fees, you can’t keep that info in your head, Apps let us update, and it’s
critical to customizing a tour. Even finding a picnic table can be tricky, so
being able to sort for that feature can be priceless when you have a car of
hungry people, and you don’t want them having their lunch on your leather seats.
We created our tour books and Apps around what info wine
county visitors need the most, and without intending to, the info most helpful
to us as guides. It’s like the idea that every portrait that an artist does includes
within it a self-portrait. By the way, if the guides have an iPhone they
invariably purchase the Apps while we’re standing there. Guides are always
looking for a good tool.
Ralph & Lahni de Amicis are authors of the Amicis Winery
Guides, and owners of Amicis Tours. They are authors of over twenty books on
health, design, business and travel. Their iPhone Apps, The Napa Valley Wine
Tour, and The Sonoma Winery Tour are a tour guides approach to these beautiful
area, complete with 1000’s of photos and insights. Their articles and products
can be found on the sites http://www.amicistours.com
and http://www.spaceandtime.com
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