mike909 Posted March 27, 2007 Share Posted March 27, 2007 (edited) Since I knew I was going to purchase a GPS (60Csx) I began looking for a website to help me locate trails for hiking/mtn. biking. I immediately found a number of sources for such information, and began seeking the best. Below are my findings. Note: I consider a "trail" to be a path in which you can walk/run/hike/mountain bike. Admittedly, my primary concern is Hiking & Mtn. Biking. I live in the US (Nevada), but tried not to let that sway my ratings. Here are my findings: Winner for best interface: http://www.gpsies.com Features include: Easily upload .gpx and a host of other formats. Also converts/outputs many different formats. Or you can plot out your course over the maps (based on google-maps api). Course includes elevation, distance, starting coordinates. Email course to friend. Integrate trail into your Blog. Searchable trails. Sample Extremely closeRunner Up: http://www.sanoodi.com This is basically the same as gpsies. One of the main differences is, the sidebar has direct integration with Flickr, so you can see geo-coded pics that other people have taken in the area. I flip back & forth between these 2 websites, but over-all I think gpsies has a cleaner interface. Sample Winner for best source of information: http://www.localhikes.com Granted, this will probably change greatly depending on your specific area, but for me this website had the most trails. Nothing fancy like the other websites, but if the ultimate goal is to find a new trail to hike on...this is the resource I have been using most. Displays info from TOPO! and allows you to download the TOPO! (which would be cool if GPS Babel could convert, but it can't..see my thread) This is probably a good time to mention, that all the websites I looked at (with the exception of 1 or 2) are user-driven...meaning that exposure and user input really dictate how well of a resource it is. Hopefully, over time, one of the 2 winning websites will become more and more popular here in the US. Honorable Mentions Below are the websites that I looked at which I think are worth noting. I italisized the most important things to note about each site: TrailRegistry.com Also based on the Google Maps API. Decent interface, just not as complete as the others. Decent exposure.(exposure=amount of trails in USA) http://wikiwalki.com Also based on the Google Maps API. Decent interface, bad exposure. http://www.travelbygps.com/index.php Decent source of info with .gpx downloads including waypoints & tracks. http://www.gpxchange.com/ Easy way to get a bunch of way-points into gps, but bad exposure. TOPO! Exchange Looks like it has good exposure, but since .tpo files are 100% useless without the software...doesn't do anything for me. http://forum.delorme.com/viewforum.php?f=34 Forum for TOPO! exchanges, could prove useful to someone (not me though, as discussed earlier...can't do anything with .tpo files) http://www.gpsxchange.com/ Could be usefull information source if you don't mind searching forums. http://www.topozone.com Could be a useful source of information, if you really want to search for something interesting in your area. http://www.everytrail.com/ Another rendition of the Gmaps api that falls short of the winning 2. Would be nice if all of the gmap renditions were consolidated (maybe that's what someone should take a day off to do) http://www.mtbguru.com/ Ditto Other sites I searched, but don't have really anything to say about (meaning...I didn't like them for one reason or another) http://garminmapsearch.com/ http://magnalox.net/index.php http://www.wikiloc.com/ ...and some more that I can not remember. Hope this info helps someone. Edited March 27, 2007 by mike909 Quote Link to comment
-Oz- Posted March 28, 2007 Share Posted March 28, 2007 this is an awesome thread. I'll be taking time to look into a lot of these that I don't know. Quote Link to comment
alinosa Posted March 29, 2007 Share Posted March 29, 2007 Wow, I was about to start looking for all this info for South Texas (San Antonio) and here i am, gifted with all this info. THNX! Quote Link to comment
+embra Posted May 27, 2007 Share Posted May 27, 2007 I started to summarize this thread and, nearing the end, discovered/remembered that you had largely done so. Let me add one other site mentioned on the other thread and one not yet mentioned. http://www.hikingupward.com/ This is a good site for hiking trail information, but limited to Virginia and West Virginia. Also good to know about Redwood Mtn Biker's GPS Data Search Tool. which takes advantage of Google's custom search capability to search some 30 plus sites like those in this thread. Thanks for summarizing and annotating this list, Mike. I'm bookmarking it. Quote Link to comment
mike909 Posted May 29, 2007 Author Share Posted May 29, 2007 Also good to know about Redwood Mtn Biker's GPS Data Search Tool. which takes advantage of Google's custom search capability to search some 30 plus sites like those in this thread. I would like to add that one to the 'honorable mention' list, but I don't think I can edit the original post anymore. I like what people are doing with google's custom search. Also, I believe we will see some creative uses of google's ability now to save your own maps directly from the native gmap interface. Quote Link to comment
+imajeep Posted May 29, 2007 Share Posted May 29, 2007 Thanks for the thread. Very helpful--I've been looking for sites like these. I'll mention one other that I've found: Backpacker Magazine has a pretty good database of trails, with descriptions and GPS tracklogs. Quote Link to comment
bobmorton Posted November 9, 2010 Share Posted November 9, 2010 Thank you for sharing all the links especially this one TrailRegistry.com I got all the information that I need. Thanks again. ------------------------------------------ Bob Morton I want to change my life Quote Link to comment
+New Jersey TJ Posted November 9, 2010 Share Posted November 9, 2010 GPSies has an awesome track maker. I recently needed to make some PQs of caches along bike trails. I make the track in GPSies.com and imported it in to my account to generate the PQ. Two tips: - Keep the track points close together so that you can narrow the range of the PQ. - Break the tracks into segments of no more than 500 points. Quote Link to comment
+Redwoods Mtn Biker Posted November 9, 2010 Share Posted November 9, 2010 Wow, a blast from the past. I'll add that http://connect.garmin.com is also very good, and has a huge database. Plus, you can create an RSS feed to alert you if new trails turn up for a given search. Quote Link to comment
mike909 Posted November 9, 2010 Author Share Posted November 9, 2010 I'll mention one other that I've found: Backpacker Magazine has a pretty good database of trails, with descriptions and GPS tracklogs. Agreed, I've actually used this one as well. connect.garmin.com seems like a good interface as well, but falls short on trails (at least in my area). It's been years since my original post, so I'm betting some of those sites are now better, some worse. Quote Link to comment
jimlarkey Posted November 9, 2010 Share Posted November 9, 2010 (edited) Thanks for the roundup. Another for the list... TrimbleOutdoors Edited November 10, 2010 by jimlarkey Quote Link to comment
+TotemLake Posted November 10, 2010 Share Posted November 10, 2010 (edited) For the Pacific Northwest, www.switchbacks.com volunteer (geocachers like you and I) submitted and maintained by our one and only Moun10Bike. Edited November 10, 2010 by TotemLake Quote Link to comment
mtbikernate Posted November 11, 2010 Share Posted November 11, 2010 Also consider: RunningFree the MapMy... family of websites MapMyRun.com, MapMyRide.com, MapMyWalk.com, MapMyHike.com, MapMyFitness.com, MapMyTri.com & MapMyMountain.com Crankfire for New England Similar, but these offerings don't provide hosting for you. If you have hosting arranged through your own web server, Google Docs, or whatnot, you can use them. GPS Visualizer GMap4 XML Google Maps Wordpress Plugin (if you have a self-hosted Wordpress.com site) Quote Link to comment
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