Route planning

[Devil1]

So how do you all plan a route to take when going for a ride? Do you bust out the map and find a road? What do you do?

[DucDave]

I start by deciding:

• about how long I want to be out
• about what direction I want to head
• the 'tone and objective' of the ride (beach trip, laid back cruise, mountain twisties romp, etc)
• group size of the ride

Then, a map and knowledge of the roads used to be my best friend. If it was new and complicated I'd highlight the route. And a good tank back with a BIG map window was all it took.

Today, I start with the same questions the plot the route in MapSource and transfer it to my Garmin.

You can also plot routes pretty easily in Google Maps and print out the directions.

[richw]

I usually include some known twisties,

Avoid metro areas like the plague. I onl;y use expressways to fly over metro areas

Look on a map for what appears to be a good connector
or road I haven't been on.

I use Google maps to zoom in and see the actual twisties.

Also Jimapco has GREAT map western PA and Berkshires
Not gas far apart must plan

[xbootlickx]

I use google maps and try to connect my loc to destination with twisties. if im solo i take roads ive never been on and with groups i use known roads..
since my gps mount for the bike broke ive been going off of memory or the map on tank bag

[Cheese]

So how do you all plan a route to take when going for a ride? Do you bust out the map and find a road? What do you do?

Microsoft Streets & Trips.

Usually I've got a theme or destination ahead of time. An example would be a "trail ride" where I want to hit the Mohawk Trail, Taconic Trail and Molly Stark Trail all on one route or a "zooming Green mountain ride" where I've used electronic maps to "zoom" in on passes through the Green mountains that are worth exploring.

I then use those points as waypoints in mapping software and get time and mileage. Usually I tweak the route at that point to add other roads along the way if there's time or substitute slab if the day is getting too long. MS Streets & Trips also shows gas and food so I can typically plan 100 mile legs between gas stops and pick a restaurant to hit either side of noon. If it's a multi-day route I'll try to make sure I'm in a larger town at 6:00pm so an abundance of beds are available.

I don't have a motorcycle GPS so I'll copy turn-by-turn directions for each leg to a spreadsheet and edit out the "keep straight on" instructions and print it for my tank bag. If I'm with another rider that has a GPS I'll forward the waypoints to them as addresses and let them enter the route that way.

[RandyO]

I use several different methods dependng on what kind of ride

the toughest route planning is for IBA rides, I probably put 50 hours of planning into the BBG I did back in June, the ride only took 23 hours

I used google map, my garmin software, thenextexit.com, also each state's DOT website, I had reliable information on fuel stops, construction


sometimes I utilize my growing library of Delorme Atlases (have 20+ states)

most of the time I don't plan, I just ride

[Devil1]

I really appreciate the replies!

[toocrazy2yoo]

Good tips all. Are you guys finding that pretty much all the hotels have wireless internet these days? I got it in mind to take a ride out to Niagra Falls, up to Qu'ebec and back through Maine after Labor Day when my move North is finally complete. Gotta do it quick before it gets too damned cold. Christ-a-mighty, I've had this bike for a month and a half and I've only got 1500 miles on it.

Gonna make up a couple of boxes of clothes to have overnighted wherever I land for a couple of days at a time so I don't wind up doing the laundra-mat thang. Between planning and the GPS at gas stops, what can go wrong?

[R7]

It takes several exploring rides usually alone to come up with a good route. I've found that mapping roads with whatever you're using can be hit or miss, usually miss!
1. Explore the area you like riding
2. Keep track of the roads you like best
3. Once you've got your fun roads figured out, just connect the dots to link them together into a loop.
4. When you have a fun loop, call me and I'll come up riding for a weekend

[R1]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 3_0_1 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/528.18 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/4.0 Mobile/7A400 Safari/528.16)

I typically ride til I'm lost am try to find my way home. Always find good roads that way.

In unfamiliar areas I'll stick to the main roads til the houses start to spread out then I'll start hittin up the side roads.

If I plan a ride. Usually google maps is useful. Find out the area you plan to ride in and see what's around. Try to find the roads you saw on google maps and when all else fails refer to step one. Gettiing lost and trying to find your way home.

It's worked out for the most part. Although one time I ended up completely lost out in western MA. All I was trying to do was make it back to rte2 and I ventually found it but not after some great roads I'll never be able to find again and about 6 hours more riding than i initalu planned.

I think my system might be slightly flawed, but it's so much more fun when you have no fucking clue where ou are or how to get where you want to go.

[richw]

I just used my GPS to route around other tourists at Newport

It was almost funny that the street signed roads were bumper to bumper and the parallel roads had almost no traffic.

[markbvt]

Pretty much what DucDave said.

Google Maps is your friend. I'll typically spend a while looking at it, envisioning a loop that looks like it would be fun. I'll usually also zoom in on the various segments of the route, if I haven't ridden there before, to make sure the roads don't have tons of little intersections (a sure sign of a nasty suburban shithole). Thankfully, living in northern Vermont, this is typically only an issue when touring because we don't have many suburbs around here.

A lot of the time I'll plan a day ride to include a particular road that's fun to ride. Or I might try to string together as many dirt roads as possible if I'm in the mood to ride my dual-sport.

Any route that includes significant segments I don't know well gets uploaded to my GPS. This makes like a lot easier than stopping constantly to consult maps (especially helpful with the aforementioned dirt road rides).

--mark

[Devil1]

It takes several exploring rides usually alone to come up with a good route. I've found that mapping roads with whatever you're using can be hit or miss, usually miss!
1. Explore the area you like riding
2. Keep track of the roads you like best
3. Once you've got your fun roads figured out, just connect the dots to link them together into a loop.
4. When you have a fun loop, call me and I'll come up riding for a weekend

I've got a couple.