TravelCharika

Find what TravelCharika has a page for, by name: places, countries, regions, kinds of place ("beaches"), trips, departure cities, comparisons, months and holidays. Matches as the site's own search box does: accents ignored, a name a place is also known by ("Bombay"), one letter off ("Marrakesh"), and a month among the words ("bali in may") gives that month's page. Returns each match's kind, name, the id the other tools take, and its page. Call it first whenever you have a name rather than an id; nothing matching gets the nearest names instead.

{
  "type": "object",
  "properties": {
    "query": {
      "type": "string",
      "minLength": 1,
      "maxLength": 100,
      "description": "What to look for: a place, country, region, kind of place, city to fly from, or a phrase such as \"bali in may\" or \"beaches december\"."
    },
    "limit": {
      "type": "integer",
      "minimum": 1,
      "maximum": 25,
      "default": 10,
      "description": "At most this many matches."
    }
  },
  "required": [
    "query"
  ],
  "additionalProperties": false
}

When to go to one place: TravelCharika's verdict for each of the twelve months (sweet spot, good, ok or avoid) with its reason, scored from ten years of measured climate, the public holidays that crowd it and observed fares; the typical daytime high, rainy days (what counts as one is in the answer's rainy_days_are: days with at least 1 mm of rain, as a weather station counts them), humidity and sunshine of each month; the sweet spot; and the verdict in one sentence, as the place's page says it. Give from_city for the typical return fare from that city by month, in its own currency, where the site has seen fares. A busy month is a crowded one, not a bad one; `crowds` gives the busiest and quietest months as the page's graph of how busy it gets shows them, and how that is measured.

{
  "type": "object",
  "properties": {
    "place": {
      "type": "string",
      "minLength": 1,
      "maxLength": 100,
      "description": "A place TravelCharika covers: its id from search_places (\"bali\") or its name (\"Bali\", \"Da Nang\", \"Ubud\")."
    },
    "from_city": {
      "type": "string",
      "minLength": 2,
      "maxLength": 60,
      "description": "One of TravelCharika's departure cities, by its airport code (\"DEL\", \"LON\") or its name (\"Delhi\", \"London\", \"Bombay\"). Optional: for that city's fares."
    }
  },
  "required": [
    "place"
  ],
  "additionalProperties": false
}

Where to book a trip to one place, as the place's page shows it to that reader: the booking sites people in the reader's own country use, in the order they know them (flights, a room, things to do, car hire, travel insurance, an eSIM for data), and the brands to book with directly (the airlines the schedules show flying the route, hotel groups and luxury houses with a hotel there, car renters with a counter in its country), each address filled in for the place and the route. No address carries dates: each site opens on its own search. Some sites pay TravelCharika a commission, which never decides whether or where one is listed; show the result's disclosure with the links.

{
  "type": "object",
  "properties": {
    "place": {
      "type": "string",
      "minLength": 1,
      "maxLength": 100,
      "description": "A place TravelCharika covers: its id from search_places (\"bali\") or its name (\"Bali\", \"Da Nang\", \"Ubud\")."
    },
    "kind": {
      "type": "string",
      "enum": [
        "flights",
        "airline",
        "stay",
        "direct",
        "luxury",
        "do",
        "car",
        "rental",
        "insurance",
        "esim"
      ],
      "description": "Only this kind of row: flights, airline, stay, direct (hotel groups), luxury, do (things to do), car, rental (car renters), insurance or esim. Every kind if left out."
    },
    "reader_country": {
      "type": "string",
      "minLength": 2,
      "maxLength": 60,
      "description": "Where the reader lives, as a two-letter ISO 3166 code (\"GB\", \"IN\") or an English name: whose sites to list. Taken from from_city when left out."
    },
    "from_city": {
      "type": "string",
      "minLength": 2,
      "maxLength": 60,
      "description": "One of TravelCharika's departure cities, by its airport code (\"DEL\", \"LON\") or its name (\"Delhi\", \"London\", \"Bombay\"). Where the reader flies from: needed for flights and airlines, and gives their country and currency."
    }
  },
  "required": [
    "place"
  ],
  "additionalProperties": false
}

How to get from one of TravelCharika's departure cities to a place: the airlines the flight schedules show flying the route, nonstop or with the hub they change at and between which airports, each with its own booking page; the ways that were measured (a nonstop's flights a day, a road's distance and driving time); the distance and an estimated flight time; the airports that serve the place; and Wikivoyage's "Get in" for it where the site quotes one. Never a fare or a timetable: booking_links is where prices live.

{
  "type": "object",
  "properties": {
    "from_city": {
      "type": "string",
      "minLength": 2,
      "maxLength": 60,
      "description": "One of TravelCharika's departure cities, by its airport code (\"DEL\", \"LON\") or its name (\"Delhi\", \"London\", \"Bombay\")."
    },
    "place": {
      "type": "string",
      "minLength": 1,
      "maxLength": 100,
      "description": "A place TravelCharika covers: its id from search_places (\"bali\") or its name (\"Bali\", \"Da Nang\", \"Ubud\")."
    }
  },
  "required": [
    "from_city",
    "place"
  ],
  "additionalProperties": false
}

Two places side by side, month by month: which is the better pick in each month (or either, or neither), the verdict in one sentence, how far apart they are and the ways between them that were measured, and each country's practical facts. TravelCharika compares places in the same region; for two it does not compare, call best_months for each.

{
  "type": "object",
  "properties": {
    "a": {
      "type": "string",
      "minLength": 1,
      "maxLength": 100,
      "description": "The first place. A place TravelCharika covers: its id from search_places (\"bali\") or its name (\"Bali\", \"Da Nang\", \"Ubud\")."
    },
    "b": {
      "type": "string",
      "minLength": 1,
      "maxLength": 100,
      "description": "The second place. A place TravelCharika covers: its id from search_places (\"bali\") or its name (\"Bali\", \"Da Nang\", \"Ubud\")."
    }
  },
  "required": [
    "a",
    "b"
  ],
  "additionalProperties": false
}

What to know about a country before going, as TravelCharika prints it: the currency, plug types and voltage, which side of the road they drive on, how expensive it is against the United States, the UK Foreign Office's travel advice with its link -- and beside it the US State Department's and Global Affairs Canada's, each in its own words with its level and link, for a reader from those countries -- and the places the site covers there with their best months. Then on arrival, put together by hand with its sources and the day it was checked: the ride-hailing, map and messaging apps people there use, how people pay (and whether India's UPI works for a visitor from India), each place's transit card, tipping, and the emergency numbers.

{
  "type": "object",
  "properties": {
    "country": {
      "type": "string",
      "minLength": 2,
      "maxLength": 60,
      "description": "A two-letter ISO 3166 code (\"ID\") or an English name (\"Indonesia\")."
    }
  },
  "required": [
    "country"
  ],
  "additionalProperties": false
}