I dug the summer road bike out for the first ride of the season at the weekend for some exploring of new back roads.

One thing which kinda spoilt (first world problem) was stopping at junctions to check google maps and where I needed to go. Therefore I need/want tech to improve my ride enjoyment.

When I’m away with work, I often use google maps which gives turn by turn verbal instructions with earphones. This is what I want. I don’t ride listing to music, but would happily ride with one earphone in to give me directions when a turning was coming up (not interested in music on the bike on the whole).

IS there away of plotting a gpx route on the laptop at home, uploading to google maps or similar and following that trail.

I’m kinda loath to spend £200 on a garmin 800 to solve this issue as that would pay for flights and a weeks hotel for a spring riding week in Mallorca…

The ViewRanger app is pretty good for that. Plot the route as a series of waypoints and it will navigate you between them (works well off road too).

Or you could try the CycleStreets / BikeHub apps which give route-planning and spoken sat-nav style instructions.

Do you have a smartphone? PLenty of apps around which may or may not rip through data and will rip through battery. If you have android, then OSMAND will do what you want with maps held locally on the device rather than downloading on the fly.

edit – the nice thing about say a garmin 800 is that the battery lasts for ages, so you can still use your phone during/at the end of a ride without having to lug extra battery packs etc…

What’s good for the iPhone? Can’t find viewranger on the App Store.

Googlemaps will give you turn by turn nav.
You can plot a route in maps with a mouse click and then just save it.
Voila – open it on the phone and they are all in there.

Garmin 800 does that job very well for me 🙂

What’s good for the iPhone? Can’t find viewranger on the App Store.

❓ The three I mentioned are all available on iPhone in the App Store, including Viewranger (called “Viewranger GPS” by “Augmentra” – available in free or paid versions)

hammyuk – Member
Googlemaps will give you turn by turn nav.
You can plot a route in maps with a mouse click and then just save it.
Voila – open it on the phone and they are all in there.

I tried this but I altered the route to take in a couple of the wee roads I found. When I shared the route to my phone it never took in the altered route, just the default route.

PLenty of apps around which may or may not rip through data and will rip through battery

Definitely good to stick to apps that let you pre-load map data (such as ViewRanger) – that way you don’t burn through data and you still have maps when not in reception.

the nice thing about say a garmin 800 is that the battery lasts for ages, so you can still use your phone during/at the end of a ride without having to lug extra battery packs etc…

You are just changing what you are lugging though. An extra battery pack weighs considerably less than a Garmin 800.

An extra battery pack weighs considerably less than a Garmin 800.

depends on the battery pack really, both mine (even my smaller one) are waaaaay more than an 800. And you don’t have the faff of changing/charging/mounting a phone.

Horses for courses though as to which you prefer.