What’s your preferred method of charging phone, Garmin etc on a 5 days+ tour?

I’m planning on a trip that will be part wild-camping and part Premier Inn/B&B, aiming for 70/80 miles a day so probably enough to drain the Garmin. Obvs on hotel nights I could charge from the mains, but am thinking of an AA battery-powered thing for charging when camping out. I’m thinking it’s probably going to be easier to find a garage that sells Duracells than to find a mains outlet if I need to charge in the middle of nowhere.

But I’m guessing, I have no real experience …

I used an Anker powerbank thingy when touring Scottish Isles a week or two back. The campsites I stayed at also had electricity.

Amazon?

I’ve played around with dymano hubs and battery packs with some success in the past but find you need to be doing 14mph for at least 50 miles to really make it worth it, and have enought power to charge a battery pack enough to charge phone and GPS, which when off road (as most of my trips are) is pretty hard to do!

More recently I’ve used a 11000mah battery pack and charged every 3-4 days using a mains supply, which are surprisingly easy to find when in a campsite.

I too use an Anker Powerbank, take USB charge lead and travel charger.

I have a regime when I enter the Hotel or BnB, check phone charge if over 50% charge Powerbank first, then Phone (because I can leave the Phone on overnight without worrying if I’ve enough charge in it for the next day)
Then I use the Airplane Off thingy on the Phone unless I need the Phone to make calls, very rarely do I leave it on, just don’t want to hear the phone go off when i”m riding, if it’s important I’ll pick it up when I stop.

As above, I’ve used powerbanks to charge garmin/phone while away from power supply.

I have an Anker one that has 10,000 mAh – that’s enough to keep a Garmin 810 and iPhone 6 going for 3 days with a wee bit to spare.

I have an Anker one that has 10,000 mAh – that’s enough to keep a Garmin 810 and iPhone 6 going for 3 days with a wee bit to spare.

Ah, that’s the crucial bit of info I needed but forgot to ask – thanks. Sounds like the best option I think.

Another question – do you wait for the Garmin to discharge before plugging in the power bank thing, or do you leave it plugged in all the time?

I have a 10k mah Anker battery from which charge my phone, mp3 player, kindle, etc overnight. I either charge this from my dynamo hb while I’m riding or when I’m on a campsite. A dynamo hub isn’t 100% necessary, but with it, I find I don’t have to stress about finding electrical outputs when I’m doing more wild camping.

Another question – do you wait for the Garmin to discharge before plugging in the power bank thing, or do you leave it plugged in all the time?

I rarely ride far enough to completely deplete my Garmin. On the rare occasion where it’s likely to happen I’ve plugged in when the battery has started getting low.

The other thing to look at is what sort of navigation do you need.
The last long social tour i did needed virtually no navigation at all. Sort of “get on this track, ride for 20km, turn left, ride for 10km” so i pretty much turned the garmin off. Eventually got 2 days riding out of it and still had over 10% left. So switched on for about 14 hours. In normal use i get about 6 or 7 hours.

I use a Garmin Oregon. AA rechargeables give 12-15 hours and can be recharged in the device.

I usually only need to charge the Garmin in the evening, but if it’s going to be a big day I’ll plug it in during meal stops. Can’t be bothered figuring out how to rig it so that I could plug it in mid-ride. IIRC, on my old Edge500 plugging in caused the unit to reset and save the ride. Worth checking what yours does before you set off on tour.

Also echo the above advice to leave phone on airplane mode when not in use – saves battery as well as roaming data if you’re abroad.

Was going to respond but steezysix said pretty much what I do/recommend.

Thanks all.

I rode NCN 72 CTC last year, used Anker as mentioned and the crossing took me 4 days, 3 overnight stops. Used Garmin 1000 for nav with brightness turned right down but TBT on, Garmin had 70% charge left on day 1 so I didn’t recharge it for the second day, Phone still had 90% charge until the evening when I made a few calls, day 2 Garmin had an issue finding satellites so chomped about 20% but still 40% left at end of day but I did recharge it because the next day was the bumpy bit Hexham way and just wanted to feel comfortable following the right route as it twists and turns a lot around Hadrian Wall, recharged Anker and Phone and Garmin that night, day 3 Garmin had 60% left at end of day, phone 90% so didn’t bother charging either for the last day as it’s a fairly easy pootle along cycle paths and small B roads. Also, I always turn of wifi on phone unless the 3/4G signal is pants then I use BnB/Hotel wifi for calls etc.

Did a Tour of the Dutch Classics with same setup, 6 days of riding and using similar setup produced similar results of usage.

Anker as above. Fully charged it charged my Garmin every day for a week. Probably would do more but didn’t try.
Phone. Surely in this day and age a phone will allow you to switch on, call home then switch off again and last for a week or two.
Better still leave the damn thing at home and tell the missus that you’ll ring when you can.

I use a dynamo with a K-lite charging an iHarbort 5aH battery (£7 of Amazon). From that I have a USB splitter cable going to my etrex and my phone. On the road it works really well, can go forever without mains supply.
If you go this route make sure the battery supports pass through charging.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/iHarbort-5000mAh-external-Battery-Charger/dp/B00TC05ZPE

I did the sdw this weekend without a dynamo and used just the power bank, only used 25% of it to run the Garmin over 15 hours.