Great Western Trail Tracks Wanted bits and pieces OK!!!!

[wbbnm]

Okay I posted my tracks and guesses at waypoints here:

http://www.gpsxchange.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=3209

I believe the CDT, Shadow of the Rockies and GWT are all different. I think the CDT pretty much follows the continental divide and as such stays high. From what little I know the Shadows route stays lower. Both of these go thru New Mexico and Colorado. The GWT goes thru Arizona and Utah. I have never ridden north of these places.

[craftycoder]

That is exciting to hear NT. I'm looking forward to seeing that route.

[Countdown]

I now have 2-3 active logs of GWT. I will edit them and post it on GPSXchange in a few days.

[wbbnm]

I have now added my GWT Info gpx file to craftycoder's Dual Sport Maps web site. I quicly learned the web site software does not work well with Explorer 7. I had to run Google Chrome to get the file downloaded and even see the first page.

[craftycoder]

Originally Posted by wbbnm

I have now added my GWT Info gpx file to craftycoder's Dual Sport Maps web site. I quicly learned the web site software does not work well with Explorer 7. I had to run Google Chrome to get the file downloaded and even see the first page.

Link to wbbnm's map.

[Countdown]

OK I updated GWT file on GPSXchange.com with the Active Log from AZ and Big Dog's trip. I tried to post here but note said I had too much posted. GPSXchange seems to be by far the easiest plact to post tracks.

Please let me know if you have any corrections!

[floundermike2010]

Thanks for the information and the link

[wbbnm]

We rode a section of the GWT from north of Flagstaff down to just north of Jerome last week. It was a great ride. The portion north of I-40 was mainly wide gravel roads. Things got a little more primitive and fun south of I-40. The only slightly difficult spot was coming down the mountain into the Verde River valley. The trip down and up the valley was spectacular. We chose to go into Jerome rather than turn west and stay on the GWT.

Our original plan was to go around the mountain at Flagstaff and pick up the GWT farther north, but the road we started on was closed due to Fire Recovery.

The trail was well-marked with carsonite signes with the round GWT logo.

We had planned to get on a dirt road south out of Jerome and go over to Camp Verde, but the road was closed.

I managed to attach the gpx file of the GWT portion of the ride.

This was part of a week long mostly dirt loop from Albuquerque to the GWT and back.

I posted the full route on both GpxXChange (West, "Great Western Trail Info") and on DualSportMaps ("New Mexico Arizona Great Western Trail")

The green line is the GWT. Red lines are part of the ride getting there and out. Cyan line is our intended track.

[Countdown]

What was you source of the route?

Attached is what I have collected. The numbered tracks are Big Dog's saved tracks, don't remember where I got the Active Log.

[HogWild]

Originally Posted by Countdown

The numbered tracks are Big Dog's saved tracks, don't remember where I got the Active Log.

The "Navajo Lookouts" recorded track along the Eastern edge of the Grand Canyon is from Crawdaddy. I don't think that's an official part of GWT, but definitely a MUST SEE area!

[wbbnm]

I got my info from the Benchmark maps book on Arizona. If you look really close you can see little "GWT" annotations in green in several places. Since these are pretty sparse, you then have to make an educated guess as to where the trail really is. I think the fact that the roads we took were GWT-marked for all of our trip that I can remember means were on one of the correct routes.

Here is a map of the GWT and one of our entire trip and a picture of what was probably the hardest spot. It was harder than it looks in the picture but not really all that hard and I would not hesitate to go up it the other direction.

GWT map


Full trip Map




"Hard" spot coming down to Verde River

[HogWild]

I just took a look at Arizona. This map from greatwesterntrail.org shows various trail paths. I took that map image and overlaid it on Google Earth along with the GPS track files from both Jerry and wbb. In some places the tracks from Jerry and wbb are exactly on the map path, and other places they divert from the map path, sometimes by a large distance. And Crawaddy's tracks in Jerry's file match a few short portions of the GWT. Even my own tracks north of Flagstaff accidently went on GWT for about 5 miles. I remember seeing some sort of official trail sign at one particular point along the way (35°43'4.35"N 111°49'19.89"W), but I didn't stop and study it.

If you like the maps from greatwesterntrail.org, it's pretty easy to use the Google Earth image overlay tool and the semi-transparent feature to show them in Google Earth. Once you have them in there, lined up correctly, it's also pretty easy to draw a GE path following the lines on the maps, then convert the GE paths into a GPS file. The whole thing could be done in one day.

[wbbnm]

I did the pretty much the same thing using "this map". I too found that there were siginificant differences between that map and what my Benchmark maps showed especially where it crossed 89 alt east of Prescott.

I didn't know about the picture map overlay feature in Google Earth. I will try it out.

BTW has anybody had any trouble riding Crawdaddys route along the eastern rim of the Grand Canyon? I think the fact that is on Navajo land is reason it is not in the GWT.

We rode some dirt roads on the res in wester NM and eastern AZ on our trip last week, and nobody bothered us. But they were marked as county roads on all my maps.

[HogWild]

Originally Posted by wbbnm

BTW has anybody had any trouble riding Crawdaddys route along the eastern rim of the Grand Canyon? I think the fact that is on Navajo land is reason it is not in the GWT.

We didn't follow Cradaddy's tracks, but we did ride in that same Eastern Grand Canyon area without problems. We ran into LOTS of locked gates near Page, which really screwed up that trip. But it looks like GWT goes East from Lees Ferry, bypassing the Page area and all those locked gates. If you go into some places, like the Havasupai indian areas (Western Grand Canyon), they can be super uptight about you "passing through".

[Countdown]

Originally Posted by HogWild

I just took a look at Arizona. This map from greatwesterntrail.org shows various trail paths. I took that map image and overlaid it on Google Earth along with the GPS track files from both Jerry and wbb. In some places the tracks from Jerry and wbb are exactly on the map path, and other places they divert from the map path, sometimes by a large distance.

If you like the maps from greatwesterntrail.org, it's pretty easy to use the Google Earth image overlay tool and the semi-transparent feature to show them in Google Earth. Once you have them in there, lined up correctly, it's also pretty easy to draw a GE path following the lines on the maps, then convert the GE paths into a GPS file. The whole thing could be done in one day.

Scott, This sounds like something only a rocket scientist could do. Can you create a file with just the basic (low resolution) GWT.org path and the Benchmark map path?
Like I said, I have is Big Dog's very crude Saved tracks, and someone elses hand drawn tracks.