Several problems with caches along a route

[+skhar]

Hi everyone trying to help me

 

I want to plan some cache tours for the upcoming spring and summer (at this moment there still is a lot of snow here in germany -.-) and decided to finally use the "caches along a route" feature that I ignored all the past years. But now I have several problems using it correctly:

 

- If I use the map, that appears on the page, I can only use "big" streets. If I try to drag the waypoint to a smaller bike- or hiking trail it automatically jumps to the nearest "big" street.

- I then tried to create a kmz/kml file with google earth. First small problem here: kmz files won't upload correctly. Solution: kml files can be uploaded.

- My problem with the kml files is, that if there are more than 50 waypoints in the file, the number of waypoints is automatically reduced drastically. 51 waypoints get shrinked to ~3 waypoints and the maximum number of 500 waypoints get shrinked to somewhat about ~25 waypoints. The created routes with the reduced waypoints can not be used, since the air line between the waypoints differs too much from the original route. Best example is the "51 waypoints -> 3 waypoints" route, that only has two air lines from start to middle and middle to end without all the necessary turns in between.

 

I hope someone can help me solve this problem.

Regards, skhar

Edited March 13, 2013 by skhar

[+msrubble]

Hallo, skhar.

 

There is a lot of snow in Minnesota/USA too.

 

- If I use the map, that appears on the page, I can only use "big" streets. If I try to drag the waypoint to a smaller bike- or hiking trail it automatically jumps to the nearest "big" street.

- I then tried to create a kmz/kml file with google earth. First small problem here: kmz files won't upload correctly. Solution: kml files can be uploaded.

- My problem with the kml files is, that if there are more than 50 waypoints in the file, the number of waypoints is automatically reduced drastically. 51 waypoints get shrinked to ~3 waypoints and the maximum number of 500 waypoints get shrinked to somewhat about ~25 waypoints. The created routes with the reduced waypoints can not be used, since the air line between the waypoints differs too much from the original route. Best example is the "51 waypoints -> 3 waypoints" route, that only has two air lines from start to middle and middle to end without all the necessary turns in between.

 

I hope someone can help me solve this problem.

 

I was going to recommend Google Earth. I see that you are using it and have more advanced problems.

 

In Google Earth, have you tried "Get Directions"? Or setting two waypoints and asking to navigate from one to the other?

 

Up near the top of the navigation pane after you enter your search for a route, there is a little icon that shows an auto, a train, a pedestrian, and a bicycle. If you wish to use a bicycle trail, click on the bicycle and see what happens. If Google Earth knows about a nearby trail, it should stop insisting on the big roads. This may reduce the amount of editing you need to do, and reduce the number of waypoints.

 

Save as a .kmz file by right-clicking on "Route" in the navigation tree.

 

Fellow geocachers offer simple instructions for a simple two-point, straight line route.

[+skhar]

Thanks for your answer. Unfortunately it did not help.

 

Using google earth I can choose the trails and streets I want, that's no problem there. This problem occurs, when I try to create the route on geocaching.com with "create a route".

I tried all of your suggestions and read through the instruction in the link but nothing can prevent the number of waypoints in my kml file to be reduced after the upload to geocaching.com

 

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/9604881/track%201.kml

The test route in this kml file has 51 waypoints. After uploading to geocaching.com the shown route only has 3 waypoints.

 

3 screenshot that show my problem with dragging the route to small bike trails in the geocaching.com "create a route" function:

http://uppix.net/4/d/d/a53d830c9f70ccd95187d86b9b536.jpg

http://uppix.net/6/5/2/956bea910f7224d18e9680d76f877.jpg

http://uppix.net/2/7/c/739c386ac375b053c7ef4fa8d4410.jpg

[+JohnCNA]

This is a known issue with Cache Along a Route. I have done similar things, and got the same results. I emailed Groundspeak tech support about it and they said it is a limitation of the current tool. It reverts to nearest roads instead of just following your track. So what I have done is to leave the "final" route alone and then expand the distance around the route to be sure it includes my trail. You get a lot of nearby street caches that you're not interested in, but at least you get all the ones on the trail. If you're determined to only include the ones that you want, import the PQ into BaseCamp and then delete all those that are really outside your desired trail. Basecamp lets you multi-select and even draw a box on the screen so that you can select large areas of caches. Tap the delete key, and they are gone. Send the finished list to your device. I've done this a few times with Cache along a route, as well as using a radius PQ to grab everything in an irregularly shaped forest preserve. Then in Basecamp, delete the LPCs and such from the surrounding urban areas. Export the finished list to the Garmin\GPX folder on the device and it's done.

[+EScout]

I never let Google earth create a route automatically.

 

Instead, use the create a Path feature. Usually just a few clicks of the mouse along the paths/trails/streets, save the file. And. Then use it for your caching along a route PQ .

[+skhar]

I create the route in Google Earth with the "create a path" feature manually. It doesn't matter how the route is created. If the route has more than 50 waypoints the number of waypoints are reduced after the upload (51 waypoints in the route result in 3 waypoints after the upload).

 

I will keep the Basecamp solution in mind together with the GSAK solution I got in the german subforum.

For now I go fine with splitting the route in several smaller stages for each day and create normal PQs. Not an ideal solution but at least I don't need to install Basecamp or GSAK and don't need to learn those programs from scratch.

[+KeeGee]

Anyone have any updates on this five year old thread? I'm looking to do a route along the Mickelson Trail in South Dakota. You can see the Trail on the GC map, it's labeled and has the dotted line from Deadwood to Edgemont. 

[+HHL]

8 hours ago, KeeGee said:

Anyone have any updates on this five year old thread? I'm looking to do a route along the Mickelson Trail in South Dakota. You can see the Trail on the GC map, it's labeled and has the dotted line from Deadwood to Edgemont. 

Search for "Mickelson" and then use the found route for creating the Route PQ:

https://www.geocaching.com/my/userrouteedit.aspx?rguid=6f744187-69a5-4778-92a4-6961347a8e0d

Edited April 3, 2018 by HHL
Added image

[+HHL]

Or use this PQ and modify it to your needs:

https://www.geocaching.com/pocket/urquery.aspx?guid=e2e5f35c-4979-4c6a-aa31-ec989ca917d7

Hans

[+KeeGee]

Thanks for those tips - I should've mentioned that I had found that route already but it's a really rough version of that trail. I ended up finding coordinates for a route from MapMyRide. I was able to download the route from there and upload it into a GSAK filter and into Google Earth. I used a very wide route PQ from the public route mentioned above, then used GSAK to narrow it down using the MapMyRide route. I haven't tried to upload the route in to geocaching.com yet. 

[+KeeGee]

I've tried uploading the .gpx and the Google Earth file into Routes on geocaching.com and got errors in uploading both. The Earth still allowed a preview but it was a very chunky route. So I'm guessing the files have too many points for a Route. At 176 km that's understandable. So at least I have my GSAK workaround as described above. 

[+HHL]

6 hours ago, KeeGee said:

Thanks for those tips - I should've mentioned that I had found that route already but it's a really rough version of that trail. I ended up finding coordinates for a route from MapMyRide. I was able to download the route from there and upload it into a GSAK filter and into Google Earth. I used a very wide route PQ from the public route mentioned above, then used GSAK to narrow it down using the MapMyRide route. I haven't tried to upload the route in to geocaching.com yet. 

Why didn't you use GSAK's CachesAlongRoute macro from scratch?
Building a route is a snap with this tool:

Edited April 4, 2018 by HHL

[+HHL]

Check if this track fits your needs:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/92rvjxzaa5g2iko/US-SD Mickelson Trail.gpx?dl=1

Hans

Edited April 4, 2018 by HHL