Using GPS

You can find more complete tutorials elsewhere, but here is a little more detail on the preparation and use of a Garmin eTrex and similar units.

Create a Profile

First of all set up a profile with the settings, screens and fields that you personally like to use. You can name the profile as you wish and can have several of them. I only use one.

My profile “Hiking” has five screens set as follows

Satellite screen - shows how many are locked in, accuracy and elevation.

Map screen - set to show 2 fields - distance and bearing.

Compass screen - 4 fields - destination name, heading (where you are going), distance and bearing (where you should be going). Plus the compass pointer.

Trip computer screen - with 6 fields, 4 small and 2 big. time of day, sunset, elevation, speed (or sometimes ETA), Distance (big), location (in units of my choice).

Main menu screen - used for managing everything else.

The order of the menu items can be adjusted to suit your needs. I like to put the next most important items at the bottom of the multi-screen menu page as an UP move with the cursor takes you to the bottom of the menu page.

Load a map

On your computer

• Go to garmin.openstreetmap.nl
• Select options for the map you want. You can do this by country. 
• Choose your map type: I use one of the first three.
• Include a TYP file (Optional): I choose MAPNIK.
• Enter an email address and click “Build my map”.
• You will get two emails. The second one contains the download location for various versions of the map.
• For simplicity choose the ready to load file. This has a Micro SD logo next to it (as opposed to Windows, Apple or Linux). The file will be called something like osm_generic_gmapsupp.zip
• Open the zip file and extract the contents. The filename will end in .img
• Rename this file to suit your needs “osm-gmapsupp-countryname.img”
• Attach the GPS via a cable to your computer, enable USB storage mode and copy the map file to the Garmin directory on the GPS main memory.

On your GPS

• Disconnect the GPS. Restart it. 
• In the main menu go to Setup then Map. Enable the map and set other options (such as zoom levels) as required.
• Navigate to a city in that country and you should see the map. Zoom in for more detail.

A refinement

• Unfortunately by default all maps will have the same name as seen in the GPS irrespective of the system filename used.
• To rename a map's internal name you will need a tool called gmt. This runs on Unix based system such as OS X and Linux. There may also be a Windows version.
• To change the name issue this command in a Terminal window in the same directory as the img file. Then copy the img file to the GPS as before.

  gmt -w -m "Country Name" osm-gmapsupp-countryname.img  

• Having done this you will find "Country name" in the map list on the GPS
• This is obviously helpful when you have several maps of different countries installed in you GPS.

Load a track

On your computer

• Go to Walk Highlands SNT page
• Click the desired section
• Click "GPS Waypoints - GPX"
• A file called "stage-name.gpx will download" (actual name will vary)
• This file contains a Route. I prefer to use Tracks.
  To convert one to the other I use GPSBabel. Using this tool is outside the scope of this blog.

Note

• In my Bundle of files you can find a GPX file with all the Tracks already converted. 
• I have joined these into a single file split with a maximum of 500 points per Track. 
• There are 14 of these Tracks covering the entire SNT.

On your GPS

• One way or another you now have a GPX file with one or more Tracks in it.
• Simply attach your GPS to your computer. 
• Enable USB mode on the device. 
• Copy the GPX file to the /Garmin/GPX directory on the device.
• Restart the GPS. 
• Go to the Main Menu then Track Manager (or Route Manager if you did not convert the file).
• Select the Track. Then use the Show on Map option.
• You're done. You should now see the Track on your map. You can change the Track colour to suit. I stick with the default which is Red.