Planning tools for rides with many stops? | GTAMotorcycle.com

Planning tools for rides with many stops?

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Ironus Butticus
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It's a bit of a long story but I'm planning several rides this summer that might have as many as 30 to 50 stops spread out over the period of as many as 5-6 days, and may cover up to 3000-4000KM per trip. I was starting to layout some of them this afternoon on Google Maps when I soon discovered that, unfortunately, it's 10 stops maximum.

Yes, I could break it up into a series of differently planned trips, but I'd much rather have it setup as one single plan.

Anyone know of any online tools that will allow this?
 
I think Tyre does this. Garmin base camp definitely does but I hate that program as it's not very user friendly.
 
Microsoft streets and trips used to do this very well (and had the added benefit of picking the fastest path through all points if you wanted it to). I haven't used it in years.
 
Thanks guys.

Hadn't remembered Streets and Trips either, but I did use it a lot ages ago before Google Maps. I just checked and it looks like it's discontinued now unfortunately, but the legacy page suggests Bing Maps instead.

Now, I was about to pooh-pooh what I anticipated was probably a crappy maps experience with Bing....BUT...I just poked around at it and it doesn't seem like it has any number of destinations limitations like Google does - I got up 20 destinations and it was still taking more.

Hmm. That might very well work.
 
Try Furkot. Takes a while to master but its google maps based but far more sophisticated and a good forum. Because it includes the major Best motorcycle roads its a gold mine and can export to different GPX formats.

http://globeriders.com/article_pages/article09_furkot/article09_furkot.shtml

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+1 for Furkot, been playing with it quite a bit, when you put in your fuel range it well give you suggested fuel stops
 
Definitely looks good, ive tried it once and was pretty impressed but got confessed and just gave up LOL
 
Yeah - takes a while.
I use it mainly for ideas as I don't ride with GPS points.....my TomTom app allows intermediate points and I just use Winding Roads and see where it takes me....I like surprises.

Furkot provides all those sample routes and draws from the Best Motorcycle routes .....so I can get good ideas.
 
Basecamp works great once you understand how it works, and I do not think it is that difficult. Does your GPS allow for that many points? I know some are limited to how many they can have.
 
Just coming back to bump this thread as I remembered it from the spring. I spent most of today learning Furkot. I had attempted it before as it's a tool of my trade (one that I don't really need much anymore, but that's a different story), but I never really fully figured it out - it's definitely something you need to just sit down and spend a LOT of time with (not much else to do on a rainy stat holiday) to fully learn/grasp...but wow, once you do, it's amazing.

I initially used RouteXL to bulk input all of my destinations and have it route a best/most efficient routing (given just a bunch of random cities/addresses , something that Furkot doesn't seem to be able to do unless I missed it, which is entirely possible), and then took the output from RouteXL (via a KML file) imported it into Furkot, and then started tweaking each stop right down to exact GPS coordinates. Furkot updates everything on the fly right down to suggesting fuel stops, hotels/motels (even based on how much you want to spend), and tweaks everythind depending on your input for how many K (or hours) you want to ride in a day.

Definitely my go to app moving forward for anything beyond a 2 or 3 stop trip. I now understand why everyone was recommending it.
 
Yeah ...wish it was a bit more intuitive ...I go to it for suggested roads but it's not my nav style as I use Winding Roads....so Furkot just supplies the general guide.
 
Try Itn Converter. It's a free Windows-based program that I believe was originally developed to plan routes and convert TomTom itn files, but it does so much more than that. I used it to plan a 6 day trip to the US which I then uploaded to my gps. You can export to numerous formats including gpx. It's based in Google maps. Fantastic program.

http://www.benichou-software.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=4&Itemid=2&lang=en

Sent from my SM-T800 using Tapatalk
 
I wanted to like furkot, and I am sure it is a great tool, but I just cannot figure it out. If you can use Furkot, Basecamp should be a simple and easy to use as really all you are doing is dropping your waypoints or start and finish address into a route and it does the rest. You can click and drag your route to go somewhere else, it really is simple and not sure why people have issues with the program.

I plot my routes out by the day, that way I never have this massive route with tons of waypoints/stops. It is not really that much work as in the end all you are doing is connecting to points on a map and letting the software route you there. Only when you really get in to tweak and adjust can it at times be a bit cumbersome. Doing it this way lets me see how far and how long I will be on the road each day. I really like this especially when covering a lot of ground and slabbing it. I was just out in Colorado and Utah last month and while the riding there is AMAZING, getting there is not so amazing and it did give me that light at the end of the tunnel seeing my arrival time for that nights destination.
 
X2 Itnconverter - I'm a mac guy as well, so no OSX version, no good.

As for Furkot being confusing and hard to learn, I wholeheartedly agree. But it's worth figuring out. It just took me finally sitting down and commiting to do so to fully grasp it, but once that happened it's planing abilities (especially being linked to Google and a variety of other third party sources for data) makes it a powerful tool.

And yes, it's cross platform. It works on any browser regardless of OS, and even opens my trip plan result nicely on my iPhone even.
 
Not very Mac friendly ...
https://www.macupdate.com/app/mac/31527/garmin-basecamp

Furkot is platform neutral and yes is a learning curve.

What is not Mac friendly about basecamp? I have been using it for years on my Mac and works great, be it on my 5K iMac or my rMBP. Track pard works great, magic mouse works great. Basecamp is a very simple program to use. Save your locations, drop them in a list in the order of your route and it does the rest, you can tweak after if you do not like the route. I never understood the issues people had with Basecamp or why they find it confusing.

In the end though each to their own and it is a good thing to have so many different options to work in the way that is best for you.

Basecamp is useless if you do not have a Garmin GPS with Lifetime maps that can be downloaded directly to your Mac/PC. Trying to use the maps on your GPS while connected via USB to your computer and Basecamp is very slow.
 
I Think macdoc was talking about the aforementioned itncomverter.

Basecsmp looks interesting but since it's tied to Garmin hardware, I'm also out. I use my iPhone for navigation (either via Google Maps or riding specific apps like Scenic) and I need compatibility with such.

I stopped being a fan of standalone GPS units years ago - they seem so limited compared to what a connected phone can accomplish. Their only advantage might be when you wander outside your cellular service area, but even that's less of an issue now with most phone nav apps being capable of downloading data for offline use.
 
I Think macdoc was talking about the aforementioned itncomverter.

Basecsmp looks interesting but since it's tied to Garmin hardware, I'm also out. I use my iPhone for navigation (either via Google Maps or riding specific apps like Scenic) and I need compatibility with such.

I stopped being a fan of standalone GPS units years ago - they seem so limited compared to what a connected phone can accomplish. Their only advantage might be when you wander outside your cellular service area, but even that's less of an issue now with most phone nav apps being capable of downloading data for offline use.

Really not sure what is limited about them, I get traffic on my Nav, as well as weather. I stream music that is loaded on an SD card on my Nav to my bluetooth enabled helmets and control through the GPS which has a media player on it with nice big buttons to use with my gloves, no special tips need.

As for being outside of cell range, that is not really an issue for offline maps on a phone that has GPS, which I think is probably most modern smart phones these days, so you really can't go wrong with dedicated GPS or a Phone GPS solution anymore.
 
What kind of magic is your Garmin working to get traffic and weather data outside big cities?

Based on what I understand, and have experienced on an older traffic enabled standalone Magellan GPS I have, this relies on a special signal that basically covers major cities only. One doesn't have to stray very far before none of these functions work anymore unless the GPS is paired to your cell phone and getting data that way..... At which point my argument for just using the phone itself stands. ;)

I do recognize that a purpose built standalone GPS does have advantages, but the disadvantages outweigh them for me personally.
 

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