Christmas week in Spain

We've had a very pleasant and restful week in Java visiting my parents and getting into the countryside. I arrived with an unpleasant cold and the weather was wet and windy so for the first few days I didn't get into the hills or sea as much as I'd hoped. Nonetheless taking it easy helped my recovery and for the second half of the week I felt a bit more normal.

The trails around Benimuraell are a favourite walk and easy to navigate, just as well as the highest point was in mist. The 'Mozarabic trail' is amazingly well engineered tot make a safe ascent up and around a limestone buttress.

We also walked the tourist path up to Cabo San Antonio from the port, descending through urbanisations to the old town. The paths in this area have been improved over the last 20 years and together with GPS mapping it's far easier to get around the nature reserves that ever before. However, do take care, the paths are steep in sections and change rapidly, so don't get caught out if you're not ready for it! A few years ago fires killed the pine trees and now they have been felled the headland is comparatively bare. Low scrubs are established but it'll be some time before the path is hidden in the trees as it used to be.

I also went for two short trail runs, I didn't have time for any long runs and perhaps wasn't well enough to put in the work either. Early in the week I ran up to the edge of the La Grandella, mostly through the urbanisations. The planes are supposedly protected land and haven't been built-up and I hope that stays the case in the future.

 Even though this is basically an urban run, it's over 200m of ascent from the coast to even this level so I took a few walking breaks! My second run  also included a few walks as I ventured onto the lower slopes of Montgo; one again the route was limited by time and underfoot the rocky paths and water-worn limestone can be treacherous. Although I have used IGN maps on paper and via Viewranger, this area is very well served by Viewranger's Landscape maps which indicate contemporary (usually) accessible routes very clearly.

In under 9km there was 300m of ascent, only a fraction of the total ascent of Montgo but even so this gave great views over the countryside around Javea and showed that there are limits to the residential areas.

Beforehand I'd hoped to swim every day but arriving ill and in poor weather didn't help me start a habit. The waves were sufficient for surfing and for a beginner sea swimmer that made the water too severe. The coats nearest the hotel was far more rocky than I had expected making it an unsuitable entry and exit point. So I had to walk to safe beach area and messing with access to the apartment and these various barriers I only managed to get in the sea once, for under 10 minutes. But that's a start and I was very pleased with being plenty warm enough (in a thin wet suit) and being able to change out of it quickly enough on the beach to not get cold.

All this mention of cold indicates my major issue in England, but with the water being at 14°C it was in the same order as summer swimming inland at home. Notably my wetsuit and hat took over 24hours to dry on the patio at the apartment so daily dips would have been a bit more cool and damp.

Southern Bernia Trail Run

I've been visiting the Costa Blanca for almost 30 years now and have always wanted to hike on, or up, the famous Bernia and Puig Campana. Until today I've not managed it due to them being 'too far to get to', 'too big to attempt alone' and other rather weak reasons. Having noted that hiking routes on Bernia are plentiful online I decided that I had to start to get a feel for the mountain, although avoid the scrambles for now; I've not got a head for heights.

Using the excellent ViewRanger app on my Android tablet I planned a loop of around 25km using a combination of IGN and open source mapping. A large proportion of the distance was on minor roads and forest trails but that fits with my running programme.

Bernia is prominent above the suburbs of Altea

From the hotel to the base Bernia was easy but the ascent through rather upmarket urbanisations was steep enough that I walked quite a lot. Gradually the building stopped and after a short, undeveloped section of road, a stone track led off steeply.

This track was restored in 2014 and is clear on ViewRanger's free mapping

For the path I assembled my poles and used them to help keep a good rate of ascent. It didn't take long to reach the wooded slopes and the small fincas hidden amongst the trees. I contemplated continuing uphill further but decided I didn't have enough time. Even though  I'd ascended over 600m the sharp ridge was much higher and not very welcoming unless you're a proper climber.

I passed two signs for the fort on my way to the tourist road down the hill and must return to visit the fort as it's reported to be pretty straightforward. Once on the road my descent wasn't rapid as it was too fast for my aged knees and it wasn't until I was on the flood plain that I could pick up speed again.

A very pleasant 24km circular route from Altea

I was very content with a pace of 7:20min/km over a trail with mixed terrain and would happily extend it by the few km needed to pass the fort.

Review of Alcatel Pop D1 for navigation: 3. ViewRanger further testing

In part 2 of this review I reviewed ViewRanger on a basic Android 4 phone.  I've used it on and off frequently now and have found that it even works well as a 3G modem as a tether to a tablet on a budget £5 Virgin SIM.

This post is just as a brief update to comment on today's use. This is the first time that I've used the GPS all day as my principle mapping and GPS device. We walked for a little under 18 miles in around 8 hours. The battery was freshly charged before setting off and at the end of the hike it was down to 69% charge. That implies it might mange 24 hours. I checked the route occasionally but I must confess that I know much of the route from memory and so the screen wasn't activated very often.  The GPS was being repeatedly activated by a helper app but the phone was in 'airplane mode' to disable 3G and WiFi sections.

Note that this is a 1:25 000 OS map

 The screenshot gives an indication of the GPS accuracy. The wooded section in the Haddon Hall estate just east of Bakewell has substantial tree cover and the contours are such that it is in a gulley. This is as good as one could expect from a retail GPS unit.

The sun was mostly screened by mist although I'd classify the day as 'bright'. The screen was readable throughout.

Review of Alcatel Pop D1 for navigation: 2. ViewRanger in use

Part 1 of this review is available here and outlines my budget setup.

I've been trialling ViewRanger for a few weeks now and have gradually refined its use on Android.  The ActiveGPS seems pivotal in keeping the GPS running during sleep. Aeroplane mode is worth activating to disable WiFi and 3G which both enhances battery life and removes interruptions from the outdoor experience.

As can be seen in the image recording of a track is as good as can be expected from a consumer 12 channel device. For most of the track the trace overlies the mapping whilst on other occasions it runs parallel within 50m or so. Note that the marked deviation from the Right of Way to the north of the 'Bird Sanctuary' accurately represents additional paths not shown on the map. The woods are mixed woodland and at this time of year the leaf cover is is slight so not an especially tough GPS environment. I have carried the phone in the front pocket of a rucsac so it is reasonable to assume the antenna is vertical, and thus probably sub-optimally orientated, but well exposed to the sky.

Track recording shown in red overlayed on OS 1:50000 

I've found this degree of accuracy consistently now and will monitor different areas (valleys, leaf coverage) to see how well it is maintained.

Route following is an important feature of ViewRanger and a leap beyond the limitation of 20 points on my old GPS12XL as there appears to be no limit to the number of waypoints on a route. I'm sure that there is a technical limit but it's considerable, not indicated in the product documentation and certainly exceeds anything likely to be needed. Online route planning is very easy with access to any premium maps that have been purchased. Route making on the small screen Android interface is possible but a little bit fiddly. If the phone is online it's an easy task to synchronise routes between the website and the phone or vice versa in a matter of moments.

The manner in which ViewRanger follows a route is quite complicated and only clear once the documentation is studied.  I don't think that I have the parameters optimised just yet for the arrival and arrived distances and certainly the cross track distance must be adjusted to suit likely GPS errors. If the cross track error is set too narrow the alarm sounds frequently and the software replays the route which might cause confusion. I discovered problems here before I installed ActiveGPS as the sleeping GPS generated off-track data when it was polled by ViewRanger.

The major problem so far is the limited brightness of the screen which makes it hard to read on sunny days. As I've only tested the setup during an English springtime to date it is possible that the device will be useless in Spanish sunshine.

Review of Alcatel Pop D1 for navigation: 1. Viewranger meets Android

Part 0 of this review is available here.

GPS linked with mapping is now well established and exemplified by products such as Garmin's Oregon, Montana and GPSMAP64 series devices. These are well known products that are accepted to be pretty reliable although there are some known limitations of the software.

To me, the major limitation is the restricted options for mapping and often high prices for high quality topographic maps. Several third parties, for example talkytoaster, provide packed versions of OpenStreetMap open source maps which does broaden the options for affordable mapping.

Sample from Look n feel by TT

Strangely OS mapping licensed to ViewRanger is far better priced than Garmin's especially as it can be bought per tile or in various discount packs.  ViewRanger also offer OSM mapping and licensed worldwide mapping. In principle the ViewRanger mapping base appears more user-orientated than Garmin's.

ViewRanger runs via a web browser on PCs and this component provides a great resource for designing routes and looking for interesting features on a map - you can use any free maps or tiles that you have purchased. More importantly the system runs as an App on Android, iOS and Symbian platforms thus covering the vast majority of smartphones. It is worth stressing that both the  desktop and mobile programmes are free, you only pay for licensed mapping.

After a little online searching I found a new Alcatel Pop D1 for sale on eBay for £32 including delivery. This is a dual core Android 4.4 device with a basic specification (512MB RAM, 4GB flash) including 12 channel GPS. The 'obsolete' smartphone market is very fluid so any given day other devices will be available.

The unit is clearly made to a budget with a plastic body and screen, all of which flex under pressure. The battery is removable which is helpful and the standard Sim and microSD easy to fit. I used a 8GB microsSD to make sure that I'd plenty of space.

The phone was readily charged and set-up with ViewRanger. I deleted as many of the bundled games as possible but some of the apps are built-in and can't be deleted. They can be deactivated though. With a bit of tidying the key icons can be fitted onto a single screen so there's no need to swipe, or more importantly, the option of swiping and hiding ViewRanger! I made a new Google account and haven't linked it to my mail/blog/calendar/paypal accounts so that I don't need to set any security. From previously using my Nexus tablet out of doors I knew that having to type in passcode was irritating whilst walking. Of course now I'm at risk of losing some credit from my SIM if the phone is stolen but again that is a new account and a SIM isn't required for GPS.

The phone boots-up in 45seconds with ViewRanger starting in 12 seconds until a map is displayed and centred to the previous known position.  GPS acquisition is varied as is the case for all devices but 30s seems sufficient in most cases.

In early tests I found that the GPS was powering down as the phone went to sleep which is great for battery life but not for navigation. I tried various settings in ViewRanger to keep the GPS switched on but none seemed to work. After a bit of online searching I found that this was a known problem. There are various Apps on GooglePlay that aims to force the GPS to keep running and I found that  ActiveGPS seems to work best for this combination of hardware and app.