Kamino

Kamino app, website help you set off on an urban adventure

» Available for: iOS app, www.gokamino.com

» Cost: Free

» What it does: Crowdsources things for you to do, whether you’re meeting a friend for lunch or having a full day at leisure.

» What’s hot: The content feels as if it is written by locals for locals. You’ll find a treasure trove of hip restaurants, boutiques and fun things to do that you might not have known about. I found where to go on a walking tour of overlooked London, a walking tour of Miami’s Little Havana neighborhood, where to hang out with man’s best friend in New York and where to find artistic types in Berlin. I found it easier to use the website for planning and the app for finding a quick suggestion for what was around me.

» What’s not: It was great for finding cool restaurants and shops that were close to me, even in my small beach town of Carlsbad, Calif. But when I started to use it to research other cities as if I were planning for a trip, it was a chore to figure out how the walks or hikes related to the bigger picture. There is a map for each individual hike, so you can see how far apart the attractions are from each other. But let’s say I was spending the night in San Francisco’s North Beach neighborhood. I found plenty of options in the area to choose from but no good way to compare hikes with others across town. At best I could favorite a hike and then plot it out with a guidebook, map or other third-party tool. It would be better if there were a larger map option within the app.

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Jen Leo, Los Angeles Times