Time Waster
Veteran
We're off to Brittany for a two week tour in a month. What mapping options do I have?
My take on this is as follows: -
Paper mapping such as Michelin or IGN.
GPS - either specific GPS unit or phone with viewranger or similar
The first is basic and simple. Doesn't require batteries or charging.
The third option has a few sub-options. We only have an ancient GPS 60 unit that has no mapping at all. That means a gps purchase. Which would result in a battery powered unit which is easy to use on a tour. The alternative is using a phone with the issues of keeping charged up. Recently I spent a week with only car based charging and we struggled to keep our phone charged up. However I have viewranger on it and even the basic maps seem good enough for us with a gpx route loaded.
The route we're doing had gpx files to download for free. That makes me want to use electronic GPS mapping as a second system with paper maps.
So how can we charge phones up? Battery packs never seem to work well for me in the past and besides the phones have enough work to do without battery draining location services.
GPS with mapping all seem expensive to me. Unless there's a £100 option I'll probably not get one.
Am I missing something?? Is there a good charging option for phones? What about charging at French campsites? Do they have facilities for charging in many of them? Some Dutch sites had lockable boxes that you could plug in your phone and lock it safely while it charged all for a relatively low price. Once backpacking on Skye there was a chemists and photography shop that would charge your phone while you did errands or had lunch. Does any particular type of French shop charge stuff for a small fee while you take a break?
Any other ideas?
My take on this is as follows: -
Paper mapping such as Michelin or IGN.
GPS - either specific GPS unit or phone with viewranger or similar
The first is basic and simple. Doesn't require batteries or charging.
The third option has a few sub-options. We only have an ancient GPS 60 unit that has no mapping at all. That means a gps purchase. Which would result in a battery powered unit which is easy to use on a tour. The alternative is using a phone with the issues of keeping charged up. Recently I spent a week with only car based charging and we struggled to keep our phone charged up. However I have viewranger on it and even the basic maps seem good enough for us with a gpx route loaded.
The route we're doing had gpx files to download for free. That makes me want to use electronic GPS mapping as a second system with paper maps.
So how can we charge phones up? Battery packs never seem to work well for me in the past and besides the phones have enough work to do without battery draining location services.
GPS with mapping all seem expensive to me. Unless there's a £100 option I'll probably not get one.
Am I missing something?? Is there a good charging option for phones? What about charging at French campsites? Do they have facilities for charging in many of them? Some Dutch sites had lockable boxes that you could plug in your phone and lock it safely while it charged all for a relatively low price. Once backpacking on Skye there was a chemists and photography shop that would charge your phone while you did errands or had lunch. Does any particular type of French shop charge stuff for a small fee while you take a break?
Any other ideas?