Progress

Q. Hikes YouTube channel & wixsite cleaned up. 1st .gpx route George Peak Circle Anticlockwise.

2020aug10mon

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2020aug08sat Original Draft

Finally cleaned up most of the blurb on YouTube which nobody reads anyway, and consolidated it to some extent here on the wixsite.

Also, finally cleaned up the Videography blogpost, which was originally part of the "Why" page, but didn't fit the kind of information given there.

Been learning how to setup a route on the eTrex since yesterday. It is frustratingly inconsistent, and so slow that you might very well get it done quicker by actually hiking the trail, and recording a track.

2020aug10mon Next Installment

Finished the George Peak Circle Anticlockwise GPS route on the eTrex yesterday, after three days of trying to get it done as precisely accurately as possible.

I tried to included every single little twist and turn on the route, no matter how slight in angle and/or distance. However, the eTrex can only handle so many waypoints on a route, then you have to start a second .gpx route-file.

GPS Visualiser is the best, all-in-one website I could find for analysing .gpx and converting files for my purposes. First thing I did, was to combine the two .gpx route-files for the George Peak Circle Anticlockwise route into a single file.

Then I made a downloadable .html map file with multiple different, zoomable maps backgrounds/surface images, plus an interactive elevation-plot cross referencing hike-distance and altitude with a correspondingly-moving point on the mapped route. Very useful indeed.

Then I converted the .gpx file to .txt with included slope (%) and distance info - which is exactly what I need for maximum elevation and depression angle and slope-length data, and which nobody else seems to consider as being important. It can even colourise slope in degrees on a separate elevation profile.

...And the best of all - it's all perfectly free, gratis and for nothing. You don't even have to sign up or log in or anything. It's just there, and you can just use it. It's very powerful, though, and "with great power comes great responsibility" - there are many settings to be adjusted. Thankfully, it'll spit out something fairly generically-useful even if you don't adjust any settings.

...And with that, I updated the George Peak Circle Anticlockwise page.

I also now realised that it is more accurate and advantageous to incorporate both elevation- and depression-angle data into the associated-danger trail-rating formula - especially if the route is to be reversed. ...And now the Trail Ratings.ods spreadsheet is in a state of flux between the previous iteration and the new formula while the .gpx data are still being generated. This should keep me busy for the next good few weeks.

Also realised that I actually have a inclinometer in a Suunto analogue compass which I could use to measure angles of inclination and depression directly on a route. I should take it along with me on my hikes. I just hope I remember to use it, and that I remember exactly where I used to, so that I can compare it with the eTrex's .gpx slope-data.