This is expected to the one of the busiest summer travel seasons ever. An estimated eight in ten vacationers kicked off summer with a road trip Memorial Day weekend. With a whole lot of traveling ahead, there are countless opportunities to use tech to make your life a little bit better.

Here’s a stack of family summer travel tech tools and tips to help you get the most out of your next vacation:

1. Don’t get caught roaming

If you’re going cross-country or even doing a bit of globetrotting, you could find yourself racking up hundreds of dollars in smartphone roaming charges. You used to have to worry about roaming for your cellular calls, but in the age of smartphones it’s all about data roaming. This can be even worse, especially if you have a Facebook or Twitter addiction.

To avoid sticker shock, seek out a carrier that doesn’t pile on roaming charges. When it comes to national carriers, T-Mobile‘s looking like your best bet right now. The company’s Simple Choice plan includes international roaming for no extra charge, covering over 120 countries. Text and data are included for no additional fee, with calls in all corners of the globe coming in at 20 cents per minute — but, let’s be honest, if you can text or email for extra charge, how often will you really be calling?

The best part is T-Mobile doesn’t require a contract, so if you have a big trip coming up, you can start a plan to supplement your other, pricier carrier’s plan while you’re out exploring the world and save a few bucks along the way.

You can also use an app such as Rebtel or Ringo to help keep roaming costs down, or buy a SIM card from the country you’re traveling to through a service like Telestial.

2. Back up battery!

Your summer travel plans are hopefully full of sandy beaches, cool drinks, nightly campfires, and lots and lots of relaxing. Your phone, on the other hand, will still be working 24/7 to keep you connected, and its battery never takes a vacation, so make sure it has the extra juice it needs to do its job by equipping a Mophie battery pack case.

Unlike some backup batteries, Mophie’s packs don’t add a whole bunch of bulk to your sleek phone, and while it makes your gadget a little bit bigger than it is when naked, it won’t feel like a brick. Mophie makes battery backup cases for just about every iPhone model, along with Samsung’s Galaxy phones, with prices starting at $79.95.

There’s also the Juno Jumpr, which we showed off in the video portion of this story. It’s a handheld high-capacity battery pack that powers up your phone or tablet, and can even jump start a dead car battery. It comes with its own small jumper cables and everything, so you can just toss it in your glovebox and always have backup power when you need it. The Juno Jumpr is priced at $89.99.

3. Tech on the beach

Tech and water don’t mix, but there’s all kinds of new gadgets that you don’t have to worry about keeping dry. Sony’s newest Xperia smartphones and tablets play well with water, which means you can take them for a swim or even shoot video underwater. Sony’s high-tech handsets vary in price depending on model and your carrier.

If you want some tunes to accompany the sound of waves rolling in, Scosche’s boomBottle is perfectly at home both on dry land or wading in the surf. You wouldn’t want to take it diving, but its weatherproof design means that rain or splashes from out-of-control pool parties are just fine. These beats will cost you $129.99.

Simply want to envelope your smartphone in an ultra-protective case? With a $79.99LifeProof Fre case you can drop your phone into 10 feet of water and leave it there overnight. Pull it out the next morning, and it’ll work perfectly, as if it had never gone out for that midnight swim. If you’re worried about dropping your phone into the ocean depths or leaving it on the bottom of a lake, simply add on the LifeJacket. Yes, LifeProof has created an external flotation device for smartphones, starting at $39.99.

SnowLizard also has you covered. Literally. SLXtreme iPhone cases are extremely durable, waterproof, and even include a built-in solar charger that will let you take advantage of the bright summer sun. Starting at $129.99.

4. Backseat bickering

An upset baby can seriously ruin a car trip, and nothing makes little ones more whiny than being totally miserable in a too-hot car seat that pulls, pinches, grabs, and just generally makes them crazy. Evenflo’s new Platinum series seats are designed to keep baby happy for as long as humanly possible. They feature heat distribution technology that keeps the tiny passenger at an optimal temperature, which means less crying and more miles with smiles. These soothing seats start at $149.99.

By the way, in the video for this story, I did something really stupid with this car seat. I put the baby in backward. The doll we were using is small, and I buckled it into the seat facing forward. The seat should have been turned the other way for an “infant.” Doh!

Keeping older children entertained is an entirely different story, as they’re not usually content to simply stare out the window. The new PlayStation Vita is perfect for this (if Mom and Dad don’t steal it …). It’s slimmer, lighter, thinner, and more comfortable to hold than the original Vita to better give kids a real gaming experience within the palm of their hand. There are a ton of great bundles, like getting the new Vita withBorderlands 2, and you can even download full games directly to the system, which means boredom goes bye-bye. Systems start at $199.

If your kids aren’t gamers, snag Griffin’s CinemaSeat, snap in your iPad, and let them watch hit movies for as long as they want. It’s easy to install and includes pockets to store important bits like headphones and charging cables. It’ll cost you $39.99

5. Keeps tabs on everything, and everyone

Hitting the sky with all your valuables in a suitcase can be scary, but Trakdot’sluggage tracking system can put your mind at ease. Not only will it send you a text message or email to let you know that your bags safely made it to the same destination as you, but it can even spot your gear anywhere in the world, if it happens to take an unexpected detour. For $49.99, it’s affordable assurance.

Misplaced luggage is one thing, but losing track of your kids in a hectic airport or tourist trap can be downright terrifying. FiLIP is a wrist-worn smart locator that functions as both a phone and a personal guardian to keep tabs on your children. The gadget can make two-way calls to and from five pre-programmed numbers, and will keep your family in touch at all times. The FiLIP itself is $199, with unlimited voice and location data for just $10 per month through AT&T.

Whether you’re planning on spending a quiet weekend at the campground, a wild week on the beach, or even an intercontinental trip to see the sights, these tech tools will make your trip less stressful, more organized, and of course, a ton of fun. What travel gadget is a must-pack for you? Be sure to let us know in the comments section below.

Posted in Great Gadgets, TechNow, Uncategorized

Quite possibly the best invention since whatever came before sliced bread, a new iOS device wakes you up with the sweet scents — and sounds — of sizzling bacon. We all knew it was just a matter of time before a “smell-o-phone” came along, but leave it to the genius minds behind the Wienermobile to create the ultimate baconator: the Wake Up And Smell The Bacon.

Fresh from the The Oscar Mayer Institute for the Advancement of Bacon, the porky plug-in is filled with bacon-scented liquid. The tiny accessory slides into the headphone jack of your iPhone, iPad, or iPod (sorry Android and Windows Phone fans), where you pair it with the free companion app, set an alarm, and then bask in the heavenly bacon-filled cloud wafting your way come morning.

I’m absolutely addicted to it. It actually smells sweeter than you might expect, the sizzle sounds beat the nails-on-a-chalkboard screeching alarm beep any day, and a man’s gentle voice also serves up a hearty dose of Baconisms the longer you wait to turn it off. My favorites so far are, “A world without bacon is like the Earth without the world,” and “Time passes and civilizations crumble, but bacon is forever.” Sigh.

So now that you’re sitting in your computer chair, with drool dripping down your chin, you’re probably wondering how you can get your hands on this little slice of gadget goodness? The marketing minds at Oscar Mayer know how much we crave our salty strips of heaven, but they’re not going to sell their magically meaty device in stores. You’ll have to win one by entering your details on the Wake Up And Smell The Bacon website between March 6th and April 4th. Now clean your keyboard, you’re making a mess.

This isn’t the first time Oscar Mayer has had some fun with America’s still booming bacon-mania obsession. Last year it launched an e-commerce site encouraging people to give bacon gifts for Father’s Day, with it’s awesomely schmaltzy, Say It with Bacon campaign. Just a few months ago, popcorn brand Pop Secret made a similar play for our senses with Poptopia plug-in and app pairing, which released the smell of buttered popcorn.

How about an egg to go with that bacon?

All this talk of bacon makes me think of eggs, which is a weird but oddly effective segue-way into another gadget that I can’t get enough of this week — the new Bass Egg speaker. It’s a small, portable Bluetooth speaker that turns virtually any surface into an amplified subwoofer.

It’s truly magical: You simply place Bass Egg on any surface you see fit, whether it’s your desk, the kitchen counter, your car, (the start-up guide tells you not to put it on pets, which cracks me up because of course, you’ll want to) and the powerful little instrument transfers vibrations to produce audio. Music is really quiet on the device until you set it down. Then, it totally booms. And different surfaces can add funky touches to your tunes. For example, a wood surface produces a much different vibe than metal or glass.

You can sync the Bass Egg up with any device that supports Bluetooth speakers, including your iPhone, Android, and Windows smartphones, so you can rock out to egghead music while your bedroom smells like bacon. It’s a dream come true!  Unlike its pork-scented breakfast counterpart from Oscar Mayer, you can buy the Bass Egg, which comes in black or silver hues for $99.95. But be warned, you’ll need to budget for several hours of time that you’ll run around your house putting it on every surface imaginable before you realize that yes, it really does turn your entire house into a massive speaker system. If only it could make everything smell like bacon too.

Want more bacontopia? Be sure to check out the video with this column, as well as the new Wake Up and Smell the Bacon commercial.

Posted in Great Gadgets, TechNow, Top tech news