MyRoute routes into BaseCamp on a Mac

Wapping

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I am new to MyRoute but not to BaseCamp. The truth is I like MyRoute but don’t as yet quite trust it to run perfectly on a Garmin GPS device. This concern is maybe irrational and, as we’ll see in this thread, might well be something I can forget about.

There is a parallel thread where a fellow had a problem with a very long (a thousand plus miles) MyRoute route that behaved very oddly in BaseCamp on his Mac and mine but, seemingly not in BaseCamp running on PC’s. I have never been a big fan of mixing software products but I thought I’d have a go using a 140 mile route of my own, created in MyRoute and then transferred in to BaseCamp on my Mac for a trip I am making in April to the Ardennes.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/wuga5iudnxdq1ga/Day out - Wanne - CORRECTED.gpx?dl=0

I then exported the route (Save as, to use MyRoute’s terminology) as a Garmin friendly 1.2 version. I also exported it in version 1.1 just to be sure. It was then easy to import the route into BaseCamp on my Mac. This was what I found. The track, I have coloured green, is perfect. The magenta route is straight lines.

66522a25358e3671281ca5bc57950bf1.jpg


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A. The track of the route exported perfectly.

B. The track converted into a route, perfectly but was then very difficult to amend. Amending a route should be easy and straightforward in BaseCamp.

C. The route, along with its four viapoints (points I must go through) being the start, finish and two points in between, did not display at all well in BaseCamp. It was two straight lines, with the two via point flags. In a word, useless.

I think there are two things happening.

1. BaseCamp on a Mac is becoming increasingly flakey.

2. MyRoute is now built around transfer directly into a GPS device or a phone and / or into assorted app’s, like Garmin Drive or BMW’s Connect. It does not need to be bounced through BaseCamp on a Mac.

To see if hypothesis two is correct, I exported the 1.2 version route to:

A. Garmin Drive, from where it went through into my XT without a hitch. In a word or two, it was perfect. Everything matched. The route was the right shape, the right distance, all the for via points were there and the total estimated time was correct. I am confident it would run perfectly.

B. BMW Connect. Again it was perfect, with one exception. The two intermediate viapoints are missing. Had I planned to meet someone there, I would have sailed straight past. Other than that, I am confident it would run perfectly.

The only real difference between it and a bespoke route that I would normally have created in BaseCamp is that there are no little blue dots of the shaping points. This is a bit of a pity as I quite like them, if only as a guide that the route was near enough right. Other than that, all the checks I’d normally run for any route looked all OK.

MyRoute recommends inserting several viapoints into routes. I think this is in case the rider goes off route. I have my XT and other devices set not to recalculate or set to prompted only ie. I navigate myself back onto the route, so the additional via points are not needed. I might though experiment by throwing more in (basically you’d only need to ask MyRoute to change the shaping points to via points, prior to export) and then let autorecalculate do its stuff or use the skip function.

What does this mean?

I guess I can stop using BaseCamp and just export routes straight to my device and phone. Then just check them, as normal.

PS I have though learned something else rather important about MyRoute routes in an XT but that will have to wait for another post. That being said, I am very glad I have learned it now, not when I am up a mountain in the pouring rain.
 
MyRoute recommends inserting several viapoints into routes. I think this is in case the rider goes off route. I have my XT and other devices set not to recalculate or set to prompted only ie. I navigate myself back onto the route, so the additional via points are not needed. I might though experiment by throwing more in (basically you’d only need to ask MyRoute to change the shaping points to via points, prior to export) and then let autorecalculate do its stuff or use the skip function.

TAKE CARE…. I NOW REALISE THERE IS A GLITCH IN THE ADVICE COLOURED RED ABOVE

If you do decide to use more via points in an MRA created bespoke route, take a bit of care. Garmin limits the number to 29. If for instance in the example of the route above, you were to change all the shaping points to via points, there are 36 of them - including the start and end points which are fixed - in total. On import into an XT, the device will split the route into two parts. The first part will have the route with 29 via points, with the second route having the other seven. That doesn’t matter other than you might well have to stop your journey in order to start route two and finish your trip.

There is a workaround to the problem whereby you alter the way that the bespoke route is created in MyRoute, by inserting the via points differently - say every 10 miles - but still maintaining the bespoke route’s shape and following the roads you want to take.

If I am correct with my simple workaround, in the example of this 140 mile route, you would end up with:

A. Quite a complex 140 mile route. By complex, I mean that it goes through the Ardennes, switching back and forth across and along roads, rather than being a more simple 140 miles trip of A to D via B and C down main roads.

B. 32 shaping points. Garmin allows over 100 of these in any one route, so you have plenty spare.

C. Four fixed via points, being: The start point, one fixed via point just after the start, the lunch stop, one fixed via point after the lunch stop and the end point.

D. 14 (ie one every 10 miles or so) what I’d call intermediate via points, simply inserted into the MyRoute route at 10 mile intervals.

E. The total number of via points will therefore be 18. The bespoke 140 miles route should import - with all its 18 via points and 32 shaping points - as one block and no longer split into two.


You could further increase the number of intermediate via points by inserting them every say five miles, providing in total you do not exceed 29. This would really bolt the route down in the event of you going off route and the device making an automatic recalculation. The skip function would also come in handy, if you wanted to miss one or two via points out.
 
If you want to add extra waypoints to an MRA route, just select "Expand" from the "Toolkit" menu. It will then ask you how many waypoints you want and auto insert them around the route at roughly equally spaced intervals.

I don't really know what use this is, but it will do it. It will also "reduce", which is the exact opposite as would be expected.
 
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If you want to add extra waypoints to an MRA route, just select "Expand" from the "Toolkit" menu. It will then ask you how many waypoints you want and auto insert them around the route at roughly equally spaced intervals.

I don't really know what use this is, but it will do it. It will also "reduce", which is the exact opposite as would be expected.

Thank you.

This tool will do exactly what I want to do when inserting intermediate via points, as outlined in post #2. I hadn’t got around to playing too much with the tools menu. You have saved me and hopefully some others some time and mucking about.

Richard
 
I just used the ‘Expand’ tool to put 100 via points into the 140 mile route, just to see what happened. It worked perfectly on my iPad. I chose 100 simply as it’s a nice round number, which I guessed would give me roughly one via point every 15 miles or so, which it did.

I then manually changed them every fifth mile into fixed intermediate via points, that I had to go through. That was quite easy. I think this would bolt any route down and permit auto-recalculation at leisure.

Here’s it is: https://www.dropbox.com/s/qrxjyxe3e...nts Day out - Wanne - CORRECTED copy.gpx?dl=0

It looks OK when I open the route in Pocket Earth. Here it is, coloured black. You can ignore the other stuff, which are just other routes I have kicking about in Pocket Earth. You can see the yellow intermediate via points, quite clearly, all nicely spaced:

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The acid test will come when I move to load it onto my XT, Nav V and into the BMW Connect app….. and then ride the damned thing! It’s all a MyRoute and XT learning curve, I’ll get there one day.
 
The acid test will come when I move to load it onto my XT, Nav V and into the BMW Connect app
It loads excellently well into Garmin Drive and from there into my XT. It is perfect, in that it matches the shape and the distance of the original MyRoute route. It also loaded perfectly well into the BMW Connected app but none of the via points appear; that is what I expected.

On an XT, the unannounced shaping points (which normally appear as little blue dots) don’t appear if the route was created in MyRoute. The announced via points (points you have told the device you must pass through) appear as orange flags.

I then Bluetooth’d the route from my XT across to my Nav V, where it also imported perfectly, too. In the Nav V it is easy to change the announced flag via points into blue dot shaping points, without altering the route in any way. It is a slightly slower process on the XT as it recalculates the route each time you amend a single via point. On the Nav V you simply amend them all, there is then there is a single recalculation at the end.

On the XT, when you change the via point from an announced flag to an unannounced shaping point, the flag is replaced by a little blue dot. The same happens on the Nav V.

Conclusion:

A. The ‘Expand’ tool is good, as it helps to fix routes.

B. Coupled to automatic recalculation and the skip point button, a route with a decent number of announced via points in it should work well and all but guarantee you stay near enough on route, ie going down the roads you wanted to go down.

C. With enough via and shaping points, any recalculation changes to a bespoke route should be small.
 


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