[Closed] Multiday navigation for technophobes.

I use a Garmin Oregon and Garmin Basecamp.

Plot the route on Basecamp, export to Oregon as a Track.

Same mapping on both means no variations.

Plotting it on Basecamp lets me see the route in context and understand all the bits that are important (road crossings, fords, services etc).

For something like the BD, a track will already exist. In that case, I'd still load it onto Basecamp and then browse it to identify all the above points, then put it on my Oregon.

Oh - as a general point - I rarely, if ever, bother with 1:25k mapping (paper or digital).

£20 subscription to OS and print out what you need at a scale that suits. Plus you have it on your phone if you want to plot a route and follow it on a smartphone against pre-downloaded OS maps. Winner winner retro + techno dinner!

Agree with your comments on Garmin. Their software is horrendous glitchy bug-ridden crap (although the mapping isn't bad) but as market leaders they have little interest in sorting it out, they just keep selling "new and improved" crap.

OS now do a range of GPS units (with their own mapping) if that's of interest?

Otherwise you're limited to some sort of Audax style route card derived from an OS map...

One point about Scotland is that once you start on a track then you are likely to be riding it for several hours. The Corrieyairack Pass is a case in point - set off up the road from Laggan and you are basically following that road and the track it turns into for maybe four hours. You don't need a map for something like that.

The areas in valleys where there are multiple roads and tracks are much more confusing.

If you want to see the route on "good old OS mapping" then load it into bikehike.co.uk

Like Colin I've an Oregon and haven't used a paper map when bikepacking for years even in Iceland, Finland and France. In the latter case I was there to do the French Divide which is just a GPX file, no point in maps for 2500km of trail. We ended up touring in Brittany following Voies vertes.

Given your criteria/experiences, I would suggest one of two things. One low tech and one high.

The low tech is to screengrab areas of map (needs to be Open Street Map derived, otherwise you're going to be violating the T&Cs), print them out four to an A4 sheet, draw your route in pen, and then laminate them. Then Sugru a clothes peg to your stem and swap them as you go along.

The high tech is to use a phone with a suitable mapping app that supports offline maps. It comes with its fair share of issues (you'll need a waterproof phone or case, the touchscreen will probably be a pain with gloves or rain, it'll be too reflective in sunlight, it'll cane the battery so you'll need auxiliary power, etc) but it'll give you wiggly-line-on-a-detailed-map navigation without having to carry laminated cards.

Personally I've always been pretty disappointed with phone apps (and, more generally, using a phone for this sort of thing anyway) but YMMV.

To be honest, I'd take the former over the latter. I prefer full navigation on a Garmin if I can't afford the time or energy wasted by wrong turns, but if that wasn't the case then I'd personally prefer swapping laminated cards every so often to all the downsides of using a phone.

+1 for Garmin Oregon - it just works and would survive the apocalypse. The problem with phones is they are power hungry.

Viewranger on your phone will give you OS maps

You can look at them at anytime just like you would a map, you can download them to the phone too, so you don't need signal.

Garmin Etrex 10/20/30 with TalkyToaster maps & a spare set of lithium AA.

Scuttler’s OS subscription and DIY approach should work. You don’t need 1:25k for most (or possibly any of it). 1:50k maps are still readable scaled down by another 30% ish (an OS subscription may provide this sort of option) and you likely don’t need majority area of your maps so just extract the strips you need. I’d be surprised if you can’t fit the entire trip on a double sided A3 sheet with enough detail each side of the route to let you go off plan a mile or two at a time: let’s say 6 stripes on an A3 sheet printed at 1:75k - gives you 189km of end to end distance (each strip could be 7km wide). Personally I’d print one master map laminated/waterproof paper and then some individual pieces for each section (can have extra details, notes, 1:25k “zoom” sections for tricky bits) etc. a section being a day or half day - somewhere when you can conveniently swap maps in whatever you are holding them in when in use.

I believe it’s possible (but no doubt a breach of copyright) to do this by cutting and pasting bing map screenshots but it would be enough of a PITA and probably resolution/clarity loss that 20 quid for a license would be a no brainer.

I do my main planning on OS maps then plot the route on the OS app on my phone.

I've got a garmin fenix so if I want to, I use the dynamic watch app to open up the route and it is then displayed on the watch.

It's a faff to set up but I used it for even small local rides so that I got quickly used to it. It's now second nature.

draw the route out on an OS style map

Iv been doing this on Viewranger on my phone for nearly a decade.
download the OS tiles you need for a small cost so you don't have to worry about signal (although these days online maps can sometimes show more detail and you can cache these too - but not contour lines so both maps are useful).
I don't care how much of a luddite you are, being able to see where you and where you have been on a map is bloody useful! so is importing other peoples routes from the internet.

Only negatives are...

1, zooming in and out is not as good as folding out a map
2, If its raining its very difficult to use the phones touch screen
3, If its a big day out I have to carry a power bank

All together though its far superior to paper maps

Another vote for View Ranger.

Buy the squares (tiles) you want, plot the route on the PC, sync to your phone and turn on aeroplane mode. My Motorola G7 plus will give me over 2 days use, possibly more if I turned it off at night.

The 'Buddy beacon' might be a useful feature for you as well.

Hth

I agree the edge 800 is an utterly hateful device, every time I trust it enough to navigate somewhere it lets me down. most recently I trusted it to work as a sat nav to take me to an address about 7 miles away to pick up an ebay order. It manged to pick a 21 mile route and I was almost an hour late.

And the re-routing when you go of course.........I've ended up back at the start before.

It's passable if you upload the GPX and manually follow the lines, but then you miss out on the turn by turn navigation.

But! The new ones are at least screen that's visible in sunlight with enough pixels to actually make out some detail on an OS map.

So I'd upload the GPX to the garmin, turn OFF any kind of cleverness or re-routing. And have a backup on your phone with something like maps.me, komoot etc in case of garmin failure. I've done 3 days rides like that and it's usable. Remember that worst case you only need to get to the nearest place that sells OS maps (i.e. any biking, outdoors or bookshop). Do split the .gpx files up though, I setup morning and afternoon segments for each day, otherwise it slows right down and crashes.

I use an Etrex 20 with cheap OS 1:50 maps. I tend to plot routes on ViewRanger on my phone, which is excellent for that and as a bigger-screen view of where I am if needed out on the trail. Upload a track from there to the Etrex and job done. It works really well but I admit the Garmin has a non-intuitive UI and takes a bit of getting used to.

TBH, for a route like the BD you could get away with just having your phone in your pocket and checking it when you get to a significant junction.

If I’ve got to carry a map anyway as backup, what’s the point in the Garmin???

Cos the map isn't necessarily stuck to your bars all the time. Although it could be.

My Garmin Edge Explore does just work, on the whole. It navigates the route you tell it to. If you ask it to give you turn-by-turn directions it will, but occasionally mapping errors cause weirdness (this isn't a Garmin problem). However if you turn off TBT directions then you just get your pink line on a scrolling map which is pretty much foolproof.

Guessing the 800 could do similar but I don't know.

I agree the edge 800 is an utterly hateful device, every time I trust it enough to navigate somewhere it lets me down. most recently I trusted it to work as a sat nav to take me to an address about 7 miles away to pick up an ebay order. It manged to pick a 21 mile route and I was almost an hour late.

And the re-routing when you go of course………I’ve ended up back at the start before.

My old Edge Touring was like that, but as I say the Explore seems to just work.

I’m in the Etrex 20/30 camp (but I think the Oregon is similar) and plan your trip on Mapsource or one of the online gpx generators. A pair of AA batteries easily lasts all day, and if you run out of rechargeables then any village shop can keep you going.

One thing mentioned above, but not really emphasised is to tranafer your chosen route as a “TRACK” not a “ROUTE”. Subtle differences in mapping or device settings can play havoc with “routes” but “tracks” should stay as you planned them.

I also just follow the line on the screen (in heading up mode) rather than setting the device to follow the track.

Try a wahoo