The #1 request has been to create a way on geocaching.com where you could upload a travel plan and get back a series of caches along that route. At last this feature is now available.
This is a short instruction on how you can create a route and generate a
Groundspeak Pocket Query to search from 1 to 5 miles along the route.
Some points first:
- This works anywhere in the world as long as you have a proper KML or GPX of routes/tracks
- We do not generate the routes themselves, but rely on outside tools like Mapsource and Google Earth to generate them
- However, we do plan to allow people to eventually click on a map to
generate a route on the fly. I believe most will go the Google Earth
route, however
- It only works with GPX 1.1 - not 1.0
- This has been tested to work with Internet Explorer 6 and Mozilla Firefox 5
Let's begin!
- Download/Install Google Earth (if you haven't already)
- Click on the Directions tab in the upper left-hand corner of the page
- Enter your start and end locations and click the button to generate your directions.
- Scroll up the results with turns to the root (should have the start/end location)
- Right click and choose "Save as"
- Save as type (*.kml) and not (*.kmz) which is the default.
- Visit the user routes page
- Choose the tab "Upload GPX / KML"
- Click Browse and find the file you saved from Google Earth
- Click upload and after a short time it will show you the route in the window.
- Check the box next to the name of your route and select the button
"save selected routes." You can also click on preview to see it in the
small map or double click on the route name to edit it before saving.
- From here you can either click on the name to add more info, make it
public, etc. Or you can create a pocket query with the "Create pocket
query" link.
- You should be able to follow the PQ creation process as it is similar to how it works using a point of origin.