Hi All. I have a gps and downloaded Basecamp. However I only see main roads/freeways in Basecamp. Do I need to purchase a map to see more detailed off road routes? Or should I plan all this in Google Earth instead? What is the best way to plan off road routes? This is for Northern CA/Northern Nevada area. Total noob here!
Posted Nov 5, 2020, 4:40 AM UTC
Up here in the Great White North I use either Canada Maps or Avenza on my Android Tablet.
Avenza will let you load appropriately geo-referenced PDFs - a ton of which the Government of Alberta have made available, and Canada Maps will let you download (albeit slowly) map tiles from Google Maps, Bing, Google Terrain, OpenStreetMap, OpenTopo and a bunch of others. Depending on how 'deep' you zoom will dictate how many tiles you'll need to grab, so don't expect to be able to grab 400sq/km to the highest level immediately.
And buy paper maps. And a compass. And little sticky arrows on which you can write the time you were at a last know point. And a watch or stopwatch for elapsed times.
I don't like Gaia. I the thing I don't like most about it is having to use my phone or tablet to download the maps in different tiles. I like being able to download maps on my computer and then transfer them to my GPS.
I use Basecamp and have no problems with it. I get my topographical maps from here:
https://www.gpsfiledepot.com/maps/view/523/
and here:
http://www.gmaptool.eu/en/content/usa-pacific-osm-topo-routable
There are other places to get free topographical maps as well.
Edit: Here is the link to the different California maps available on GPS File Depot: https://www.gpsfiledepot.com/maps/state/ca
I like this site as well. You can select the areas of interest to you around the world and it will create a custom map based on OSM data for you based on your selections.
I like that one as well.
Thanks I will check this out too. Ok so once you have the maps, you start up Basecamp. Are you able to view “satellite” image to essentially zoom in on a trail head and then start making a track/route? I think that’s how I want to do it. For sure want to plan on the computer not on a phone.
I can't find the link right now but if you Google basecamp google earth there are some good tutorials. You plan your trip on Google Earth and save the route as a KLM and import it into Basecamp.
Ahh.. I use my laptop to plan and route in Gaia. It shows on my phone and tablet when I'm done. Not sure what your issue was with the using the computer?
Third GAIA
Odds are someone already went through the place you plan to drive. I look for tracks in wikiloc and choose the 4wd option.
There's also an app called iOverlander that you may want to try. It shows potential camping spots and trails. Haven't really used it so I can't review but a friend swears by it.
Plug for https://sartopo.com
Tons of wild land firefighters and SAR teams use it.
Caltopo.com is the non-SAR version, great website and app.
Hm, I thought they have unified the two products into sartopo, but I can't find the blog now and they do appear to still be separate sites. Hmm.
OsmAnd will let you combine overlays almost limitlessly.
Here Maps works very well offline.
I use backcountry navigator. You can load ArcGIS and CalTopo which cover the US. There's also USFS. This allows you to download map tiles and save them on your device. It's android centric and may have an iPhone option. I've used it on tablets to have a larger display available while on trails.
I also like gaia gps because the user interface is great, and there are powerful layers. However, your GPS will be more accurate, especially in terrain. This thread has great advice for loading up your unit with publicly available data - I would use both, nothing like some redundancy for peace of mind.
Went to the gaia gps site, looks easy to use and tons of fire roads popped up as soon as I zoomed in on my interested locations. But I’ll need an iPad in the vehicle to use that correct? (Or phone). So I can plan the off-road routes at home on their website and save them along with background maps. Then track along when out on the roads on the ipad for example.
Thought it is worth mentioning that I went with a 1 year subscription with GAIA for now.
Here was my thought process:
GAIA was only $36 for 1 year. Thats the Premium membership. There are multiple layers that give me various TOPO maps, Forest map/info, Satellite with labels/tracks shown..tons of info/background maps available.
Spend $100 for a Garmin 24k TOPO map and use Basecamp. But as far as I am aware, that still does not even give me satellite imagery. I think thats a separate purchase - is that what they call Birds eye? Seems like a bad deal.
Google Earth for free to plan my routes and upload to my Garmin. I decided against this, although free - because Google Earth would only give me satellite imagery. It would not show me various map info (Like where BLM land is, show me tracks etc unless I zoom in and cross reference with another map somewhere etc).
I think that I am able to download my planned off road routes as GPX files from GAIA. If thats the case, shouldn't I be able to upload to my Garmin 64st and use that as a redundant tool?
Use Gaia GPS instead.
Gaia GPS is quite a powerful tool. I plan out my routes and drop pins of what I want to see through the web browser. Able to share everything with my friends who have Gaia and my iPad mini running a Bad Elf GPS adapter automatically syncs through the cell network or WiFi.
Will check it out!
I second that - just took Gaia out to Canyonlands (Maze District) Utah. Very useful.
On top of this you can download the local navigation layers from your local forest service in kml format and load those into gaia to fill in some of the gaps in coverage. Beyond that even, you can trace routs in google earth based on Sat imagery looking for dirt roads, export to kmz and import that into gaia.