In Nov 2010, I joined an Oasis Overland truck to embark on a 9 month Overland journey around Africa. (See the full route on the map below.) Starting in Gibraltar, and continuing every driving day since then, I have been recording the route that the Oasis Overland truck has taken, using my Garmin GPSmap60Cx GPS receiver. You can see the routes for the first half of the journey on the Gibraltar to Cape Town page. In Cape Town I had a 2 month break, having decided to swap trucks. On the 19th of June 2011 I joined my next truck, for the journey from Cape Town to Cairo.

Note: Routes for the period 2011-09-10 to 2011-09-18 are not shown as we travelled around Ethiopia by plane, without the truck. The journey by boat from Wadi Halfa to Aswan was also not recorded. There are some missing segments in the 2011-10-15 route, when we took a night-bus to Dhahab via Suez, and the route from Dhahab to Cairo is especially fragmented, when the mini-bus that we were travelling in blocked much of the GPS signal. The total distance from Cape Town to Cairo with the Oasis truck was approximately 19,174km, though this figure will not include gaps in tunnels, or when the GPS had a small gap whilst its batteries were being replaced. As with all these distances, it misses out little side trips in local taxis and minibuses too. The total distance from Cairo to Amman with the Kumuaka truck was approximately 3,870 km. Adding the distance of the Gibraltar to Cape Town leg (23,500 km) this gives a total distance travelled for my 2010-2011 Africa Overland Expedition of 46,544 km. For those of you who like to put things in perspective, thats 6,469 km greater than the total circumference of the earth! It really was a long trip this year!! As to actually going around the earth, I hope to do that next year. But that's another story for another time...

.All .gpx files featured on this page are available for personal licensing - this means that you can purchase them for your own uses. Please Contact Me for prices and details. All photos from the journey can eventually be seen at my GnomePlanet freelance photography website, but this may take a while, so why not check out the Central Asia, Mongolia, Russia, and India travel photos that are already there. Route Reports come courtesy of the uTrack - the online GPX track report generator.

In Nov 2010, I joined an Oasis Overland truck to embark on a 9 month Overland journey around Africa. (See the full route on the map below.) Starting in Gibraltar, and continuing every driving day since then, I have been recording the route that the Oasis Overland truck has taken, using my Garmin GPSmap60Cx GPS receiver. Some errors still exist - for instance, when the satellite signal is lost as we drive through a tunnel, the altitude can have unexpected results. When I have more time, I will try and edit these files to remove such glitches, but for now, these maps and reports will at least give you an idea of what we have been doing. The total distance from Gibraltar to Cape Town was approximately 23,500km, though this figure will not include gaps in tunnels, or when the GPS had a small gap whilst its batteries were being replaced. See below for additional notes.

.All .gpx files featured on this page are available for personal licensing - please Contact Me for details. All photos from the journey can eventually be seen at my GnomePlanet freelance photography website, but this may take a while, so why not check out the Central Asia, Mongolia, Russia, and India travel photos that are already there. Route Reports come courtesy of the uTrack - the online GPX track report generator.

After 6 months and 2 Overland trucks (Elle and Carmen) I arrived safely back in Rio de Janeiro. The truck odometers showed a total distance covered of Rio - Quito: 21,669km and Caracas - Rio: 7,800km, for a total road distance of 29,469. If I added the various additional taxis, minbuses, coaches, etc. that we've taken along the way, it would definitely top the 30,000km mark. The flight from Quito (UIO) to Caracas (CCS) on Santa Barbara Airlines added another 1744km. My Carbon Footprint for the trip shows as 1.21 tonnes for the 6 months. As the average footprint for people living in the United Kingdom is 4.90 tonnes for a similar period, I don't feel too bad about making this journey, though I do note that my 1.21 tonnes is almost exactly double the average footprint for people in India (0.60 tonnes). To offset my travels, I need to plant 2 trees, which I certainly intend to do in the near future.

Additonal Notes: Greetings and best wishes to all new friends and fellow travellers that it has been my pleasure to meet along the way - lets keep in touch on Facebook. Extra thanks to Bjorn Overland for the use of the .gpx files for day 1-5 of the Amazon Riverboat journey: he had a cabin so could keep his GPS receiver turned on all the time. I was in a hammock on deck, so didn't dare! All other .gpx files featured on this page are available for personal licensing - please Contact Me for details. All photos from the journey can eventually be seen at my GnomePlanet freelance photography website, but this may take a while, so why not check out the Central Asia, Mongolia, Russia, and India travel photos that are already there.

Contents of the GT200e package

The unit is quite compact at just 46x41.5x14mm, and weighs 37 grams. It has a single on/off button, and 2 LED indicators, one red and one blue. These are used to indicate the various operational states and status, such as data logging, transfer, charging, and BlueTooth pairing. The GT-200e uses the SiRF StarIII low-power chipset, and has its own built-in GPS patch antenna. Connection is via USB1.1 or Bluetooth V2.0.

The GT-200e connects to a computer using the supplied USB lead. This has a unique connector of their own design, which I consider a bad idea. Speaking as a traveller, the last thing I want is to carry yet another unique lead that can't be used for anything else. I thought that every company these days, apart from Apple, had standardised on the 'mini-USB' connector, yet Mobile Action have decided to design their own. I questioned them about this, and was told by their helpful spokesperson that they were concerned about keeping the unit water-resistant. This doesn't seem to bother Garmin, though, who use the 'mini-USB' connector on their fully waterproof receivers. I use the same cable for my Garmin, my camera, my card reader, and my external hard-drives.

GPS Logger Wear and Attachment

To install the GT-200e on your computer, it is necessary to load the drivers and the operating program from the supplied CD. The software is suitable for PCs running Windows 200,XP, or Vista: Apple Macs are not supported. I found that the installation went OK, though the next time I plugged in, I had to reinstall the drivers a second time. After that, everything was OK. The CD installs the main operating program '@trip PC', a trip-viewer program, and a Help guide. I noticed that Help guides for all available languages are installed, wasting disc space. I would prefer to be able to choose just one language, and suspect that most other people are the same!

The Help guide is quite comprehensive and easy to follow, and the English translation is adequate. It guides you through the full operating procedure, which with only 1 button and 2 leds is quite straightforward. The leds tell you when the power is turned on, when it is charging, and when it is receiving GPS data.

When first received, the unit needs to be charger through the GPS connection, which takes about 4 hours for its initial charge, and 2 hours subsequently. The internal battery is a 750mAh Li-ion rechargeable type, but is not removable, so it is not possible to carry a spare if you expect to be away from your computer for a while. However, the claimed battery life is 30 hours or more, so this may not be a problem for you.

Setting the Tracking Interval

Initial hardware settings are accomplished via the '@trip PC' program. I chose the 'Running' profile, which records a Waypoint every 5 seconds. If you change to the 'Walking' profile this will record a Waypoint every 15 seconds, but also increase the battery life to 80 hours. Other faster profiles, such as 'Cycling' or 'Driving' also activate the optional 'Smart Tracking Mode', which can reduce the Waypoint interval automatically when your velocity increases via a pre-determined amount.

To start the unit, press the button for 1.5 seconds. The GT-200e will then look for and lock on to the satellites. Once the first GPS fix is successfully acquired, both the blue and red LED indicators of GPS Logger will blink simultaneously twice. I found that this took about 65 seconds to achieve. Track logging starts immediately, based on the tracking interval configured in 'hardware settings'. There is currently no way to tell just which satellites you are receiving, how many satellites you are receiving, or what the current signal strengths are, even if the GT-200e is plugged into a PC, though the spokesperson at Mobile Action says this will change in the next software release. After using the Garmin 'GPSmap 60Cx' for so long, I have got used to its comprehensive display and ability to monitor the satellites being received at any time, but if you are a new user of GPS receivers, the twin flashing leds on the GT-200e may be enough.

To check the GT-200e, I powered it on and took it for a walk to see how it would perform. I also took along my Garmin 'GPSmap 60Cx' as a comparison. It is, of course, rather unfair to compare a fully featured GPS receiver like the Garmin with a small one-button model at a fraction of the price and specifications, but that's the only comparison I have with me, so it will have to do.

Overview of route recorded by the GPSmap 60Cx

Overview of route recorded by the GT-200e

My walk took a total of 45 minutes, 44 seconds, and covered a distance of 2.7Km at an average speed of 4 Km/hour. Approximately half of the walk was along the beach, and the remainder changed altitude as I climbed an inland hill to do a little shopping, then headed back through the coconut groves, which seemed to make little difference on the received signal of either GPS receiver.

Detail of route recorded by the GPSmap 60Cx

Detail of route recorded by the GT-200e

Back at my hotel, I downloaded the day's .gpx file from the Garmin using 'Windows Explorer', which lets me access the stored files directly. When the GT-200e is plugged in, nothing appears on 'Windows Explorer' or 'My Computer', so to access the recorded data you must launch the '@trip PC' program, which does the importing for you.

The importing goes quite smoothly, and the tracks are stored on the computer. Looking at the properties of the track, I was told that the 'Original Points' for the track were 556, and the 'Resultant Points' were 363, which worried me slightly, as I don't like programs that massage the raw data before I have a chance to look at it myself. The next surprise was that unless you have an internet connection to your computer, you can't display the track on your screen, or examine it in any way. I don't have an internet connection on my laptop, which has the drivers and control program on it, so the only option is to export the data as a .gpx or .csv file for examination in another program, such as Garmin's 'MapSource'. I compared the files from both GPS receivers, and the results are shown below. The GT-200e gives a VERY good account of itself. It is obviously recording more points than the GPSmap 60Cx, and both maps are fairly similar, as you would hope!

The altitude profiles are rather different, though, and the GT-200e shows some rather strange results. I guess that this is due to the number of satellites being received, which will decide the accuracy of a 3-dimensional fix. The GPSmap 60Cx receives up to 12 satellites simultaneously, and can get a positional accuracy of up to 4 metres. The GT-200e doesn't state how many satellites it receives simultaneously, so I can't comment.

This image shows the vertical profiles of both routes. The profile for the GPSmap 60Cx is on the top, and the profile for the GT-200e is on the bottom.

Vertical profiles of both routes

I wasn't able to check out the online map creation and trip-sharing at this time, as I don't have an internet connection on the laptop I use in my hotel, but will check this out at a future date, and report back then. I mentioned to Mobile Action that it would be useful to plug the GT-200e into a computer whilst it is receiving satellite fixes, and view the signal strength and other satellite data - this feature may be implemented in a subsequent software release.

Final thoughts...
This unit is a low-cost entry into GPS mapping, and a good introduction to the techniques involved. It is suitable for someone who needs to map their walks and geo-reference their photos to share with friends - it shouldn't be regarded as a serious, high accuracy device for life-critical applications. To get the most from the GT-200e you will need access to a PC whenever you wish to charge the unit, save the data, clear the data to start a new session, or change the profile from, for instance, 'Walking' to 'Driving'. As the software is not 'portable', (it can't be run from a USB flash drive), this means that the traveller needs to carry his own laptop around with him. It is not suitable to use from an internet cafe, as many do not allow customers to install software and drivers. To view your track, you will also need access to the internet, or other software that can view and edit .gpx files, such as Garmin's 'Mapsource' program. The GT-200e is not suitable for someone who spends much time in the wilderness, away from a laptop with an internet connection.

In March 2008, I joined a Dragoman truck to embark on an Overland journey from the UK to St Petersburg, via Central Asia, China, Mongolia, and Kazakhstan. (See the full route here.) Starting in Istanbul, and continuing every driving day since then, I have been recording the route that the Dragoman truck has taken, using my Garmin GPSmap60Cx GPS receiver. This model of GPS receiver has a removable microSD card that can be used to store tracks. The GPS receiver comes with a 64MB card, but I exchanged this for a 1GB card, in order to have plenty of room to store the daily files. Is that big enough? Yes - the files take up very little space on the card - typically 120 bytes per trackpoint. That's approximately 8.3 million trackpoints on a 1GB card. In other words, if you are recording at the rate of 1 per second, 24 hours a day, it would take 96 days to fill up! I estimate to have generated about 20MB of data for the whole 6 month journey.

To get the GPSmap 60cx receiver to store a daily file of constantly updated positions, find the 'Tracks' page, and notice that there is a dot next to 'Off'. Use the Rocker Key to highlight the word 'On', then press 'Enter' to move the dot to there. You are now recording all your moves, and will continue to do so until you change the setting back to 'Off'. As well as storing positions in a file called the 'Active Tracklog', which we will ignore for the moment, the GPS also stores positions in a daily file, which will be named something like '20080327.gpx' i.e. YYYYMMDD. This is created and named automatically, and can be downloaded to your computer for processing. Whilst you can remove the microSD card from the GPS and put it in a card-reader to see the files, it is a lot easier just to access the data via a USB link. Plug your GPS receiver into your computer's USB port, turn the GPS on, and click Main Menu > Setup > Interface. Select the bottom button marked 'USB Mass Storage'. The computer will then alert you that a new Drive has been detected - use 'My Computer' or 'Windows Explorer' to locate the drive, which will contain the .gpx files that you have generated so far. Copy these to a new folder on your computer's hard drive, then eject the GPS using the 'Safely Remove Hardware' button in the System Tray, and turn off the GPS.

There are a number of ways to produce an online map of your stored GPX files. The following Web sites allow you to plot your GPX data on a Web map:

However, if you want to display a map on your own website, already formatted with all the details of your track, you will need some software that can create it. First of all, you must sign up for a Google Map API. This authorises you to embed Google Maps in your own web pages with JavaScript, and provides a unique API password that you will need for each map. Note that the API applies to just ONE FOLDER on your website. You have to specify the address of the folder when you sign up for the API - for instance: http://www.mysite.com/webmaps/ All the maps that you authorise with the API code MUST be in that folder.

Next, the software. There are various programs that can be used to create the map code. I use RoboGEO, a program primarily designed to geo-reference photographs (more about doing that here). One of its other many abilities is to produce a Google map page showing the location of each photo. You can also add a track on the map, which is what we are interested in here. I simply omit to upload any photos, but make sure the Tracklog is displayed when creating the webpage. To do this, follow these steps:

1. Start the 'RoboGeo' program
2. Click File > Get Locations > Tracklog > Import Tracklog file
3. Select the required file - when it is imported, the total number of points will be displayed
4. Click File > Export > Google Maps
5. Paste your API code to the 'Google Key' box
6. Set the Webpage Title to '20081231' or similar
7. Set the View to 'Map'
8. Check the box 'Include the GPS Tracklog on the Map'
9. Set the 'Approx max number of polylines to create' to a value greater than the total points in your file
10. Click 'Create Google Map', and save it in a folder with the same name as the Title
11. Upload the map.htm and map.xml files to your server, and view the map online in a web-browser

To view the maps I've already generated, click on the links below. The map will initially load as a standard roadmap, but you can also select a Satellite view, or a hybrid view of the two, using the buttons in the top right of the screen. The amount of detail that the Satellite view will provide depends on Google's current satellite photos for that area. In the countryside this might just show a general view that identifies built-up and rural areas, whilst in bigger cities you can often zoom in to see individual buildings, and decide which exit we took from a carpark, or even where we parked in that carpark! The detail can be astonishing. You can click-and-drag to move the map around, and zoom in and out using the +/- slider on the left of the screen. Note that Google provides no maps for Georgia or Azerbiajan (why not?), and the western parts of China are similarly blank, so you will have to use the satellite photos instead.

To create the detailed Route-Reports, I use the online uTrack report generator at http://utrack.crempa.net This page will upload a GPX file from your computer and produce a detailed Route-Report that shows a number of graphs and statistics, such as:

• Elevation profile graph - elevation plotted against distance.
• Elevation profile graph - elevation plotted against time.
• Elevation statistics: Minimum elevation, Maximum elevation, Average elevation, Maximum difference, Total climbing, Total descent, Start elevation, End elevation, and Final balance.
• Speed profile graph - speed plotted against distance.
• Speed profile graph - speed plotted against time.
• Speed statistics: Minimum speed, Maximum speed, Average climbing speed, Average descent speed, Average flat speed, and Average speed.
• Time statistics: Date of track, Start time, End time, Total track time, Climbing time, Descent time, and Flat time.
• Distance profile graph - distance plotted against time.
• Distance statistics: Total flat distance, Total real distance, Climbing distance, Descent distance, and Flat distance.

Once the report has been generated, an option is presented to save it as a PDF file, which can later be uploaded to your server. To view the Reports I have generated so far, click on the links below. You will need a PDF reader installed on your computer to read PDF files - suitable software is available free from Adobe. Some errors still exist - for instance, when the satellite signal is lost when we drive through a tunnel, the altitude can have unexpected results. When I have more time, I will try and edit these files to remove such glitches, but for now, whilst I am 'on the road', these reports will at least give you an idea of what we have been doing.

The table below contains links and details of all the maps and reports generated so far:

Then, after a break in Beijing...

Then, after a few days in Almaty...

And so to the end of a truly memorable journey. Since we started at Calais on the 17th of March, the truck has driven exactly 38,138 Kms, or in other words, 23,836 Miles. Many thanks are due to drivers Toni, for UK to Beijing; Blair, for Beijing to Mongolia; Vernon, for Kazakstan to Calais; and a very big thanks to Jay, who drove the whole way with me, Calais to Calais.

Note: All route and stored position data are copyright 2008 Tim Makins and MapAbility.Com

How do you tell the GPSmap 60cx receiver to store a file of constantly updated positions whilst you are moving about? Find the 'Tracks' page, and notice that there is a dot next to 'Off'. Use the Rocker Key to highlight the word 'On', then press 'Enter' to move the dot to there. You are now recording all your moves, and will continue to do so until you change the setting back to 'Off'. These positions will be stored in a file called the 'Active Tracklog'. The 'Active Tracklog' records time, date, position, altitude, leg speed, leg distance, leg time, and leg course. To control just how it does this, and set such things as 'Wrap When Full', go back to the 'Tracks' page and select 'Setup'.

OK. We've now finished our walk, and turned the track storage to 'Off'. The obvious thing to do is to go back to the 'Tracks' page and click on the 'Save' button to save the track you've just made. WRONG! If you do that, the saved tracklog will lose its timestamps. Simple lesson: don't save your tracklog on the GPS, counter-intuitive though this is!

If you just want to store your track the track you have just made, you need to access the 'Active Tracklog' with some suitable software. I would suggest the free and excellent program 'DNRgarmin' which you can find out about, and download, by clicking here. Install and start the program, then click 'GPS >> Open Port'. The program will tell you what kind of GPS it is seeing. Then click 'Track >> Download' to grab the entire Active Tracklog. You can then save this by clicking 'File >> Save to >> File', and choosing 'Save as Type' as Text File. All your track will be saved, and no data will be lost. You can open it up in 'Notepad' to see for yourself.

The above notes are all very well as long as the tracks you want to store are in the Active Tracklog. But what happens if you are going on an extended walking tour, and want to save the tracks for your entire trip? The Active Tracklog can only save 10,000 points. After that, the recording will stop, or will be over-written, depending on how you have configured the Tracks Setup page. The answer is to set your Garmin GPSmap 60cx receiver to save tracks on to the removable Micro SD card, which lives in the rear compartment, just under the batteries. It will automatically save a separate file for each day, and will continue to do this as long as there is space on your Micro SD card. These .gpx files saved to the Micro SD card do NOT lose any data. The number of files on the card are only limited by the size of your card. In practise they take up very little space on the card - typically 120 bytes per trackpoint. That's approximately 8.3 million trackpoints on a 1GB card. In other words, if you are recording at the rate of 1 per second, 24 hours a day, it would take 96 days to fill up!

You can delete your Active Tracklog, which is saved in the main memory, at any time, but the GPX files will remain on the Micro SD card and do not affect the number of trackpoints in the main memory. Note that tracks stored on the card cannot, however, be displayed on the screen. You can only display the contents of the Active Tracklog on the screen, which effectively means you can only display (at most) the last 10,000 recorded track-points.

To access the files in the Micro SD card, you need a PC with Windows XP or above. Connect your Garmin GPSmap 60cx receiver to the PC using the USB lead supplied. Put the GPS in Mass storage mode: Main Menu >> Setup >> Interface, and click the 'USB MASS STORAGE BUTTON'. Back on your PC, start 'My Computer' and look for 'Removable Disc' - this is the SD datacard in your GPS, and will contain .gpx files for each automatically saved track. They will be named with the date: 'YYYYMMDD.gpx', and can be copied and pasted to another folder on your PC for later use. To end the USB mass storage mode, simply eject by clicking on the 'Safely Remove Hardware' button in the System Tray. The GPS will then reset to its normal mode.

To do useful things with these .gpx files, start the DNRgarmin program, choose File >> Load from >> File, and navigate to one of the .gpx files. Define the file as Point, Track, or Route when asked, and DNRgarmin will import and display the track. To export, choose File >> Save to >> File, then chose the format from the drop-down 'Save as type' box. You can also geotag photos with the excellent 'RoboGeo' program - see my last Blog entry: 'How to Geo-Tag Photos' for details.

Finally, I'd like to mention that during my research, noting all the details down as I discovered or amended them, this article almost wrote itself. If everyone noted down things during their researches, then published the notes on a Blog, we'd all save a lot of time!

I am not a great fan of sport, but find that walking in the countryside is not only an excellent form of exercise to help combat the effects of the excellent food here at Pestalozzi, but also a very enjoyable way to pass a sunny weekend, looking at the beautiful scenery of the area, and spotting the fauna and flora of the area. With the aid of my new map, I have been on a number of very interesting walks - both locally, around the estate here, and further afield.

To share my walks with friends and family I thought of taking some photos and placing them on-line. However, following some research I realised that there was another, even more exciting possibility: showing the position of each photograph on a background map. This can be achieved by 'geo-tagging' the photos. The way this is done is explained in detail later on in this page, but basically the method used is to match the time that each photo is taken with a log of the walk that is collected automatically by a GPS receiver. I had been meaning to buy a GPS receiver anyway, for a new project I had in mind, and after some research of the different models available, I settled on a Garmin GPSmap60cx, and found one at the Global Gizmos site for a very good price.

The GPS receiver can perform a number of tasks. It can show my position and altitude, and display this on a basic map. It can monitor all my movements, and tell me how long I have been walking, how far I've been, and the speed I walk at. It can even tell me how long my lunch-break was! It records the route I take, and this 'track file' is the one that I match up with my photos when I get back from my walk. More about that on another page, if you are interested in the technical details. For now, I'll share my walks with you...

Walk No. 1 - Pestalozzi to Sedlescombe

Walk No.1 (See on map : See in Gallery) was an exploratory walk through some of the woods on the Pestalozzi estate, then past the Sedlescombe playing fields and into the village of Sedlescombe, as far as the pub, just to 'test the technology'. Click HERE to open the map and photographs in a new browser. The route of my walk is overlaid on a combined map and satellite photo. Each of the red markers corresponds to a photo that I took along the way. Click on any one to see a thumbnail of the photo, with descriptive text. You can also click on the thumbnail to display the full-sized image in a new browser. Pretty neat, eh ?!

Useful tips: You can zoom in and out using the '+' and '-' buttons. To move the map, you can either click-and-drag with your left mouse-button, or use the directional buttons in the top-left of the screen. You can also click-and-drag the tiny blue overview-map at the bottom right of the screen. You can chose a background of either a map, the satellite image, or a hybrid of the two using the buttons at the top-right of the screen.

Walk No. 2 - Pestalozzi via Battle and Whatlington

Walk No.2 (See on map : See in Gallery),a total of 20Km, saw me being a bit more adventurous. I started at Pestalozzi on a sunny August morning, and walked east then south to pick up the 1066 Country Walk, which is a 50km footpath from Pevensey to Rye. The footpath follows, or so it is claimed, the actual footsteps of William the Conqueror when he landed at Pevensey and then marched to the town of Battle, where he defeated King Harold in in what many people know as the battle of Hastings. It is a lovely route, through stunning countryside, fields and woodland with comparatively few people about. Crossing the busy A21 London Road, the walk continues across the Sedlescombe Golf Club, then through the Great Wood to the town of Battle, with its ancient church of St Marys, and the famous Abbey of St Martin, built in 1338. Battle is a very popular tourist destination, and was quite busy that day, so I didn't stay long, but headed up the Netherfield Road to the Battle Golf Club. A pleasant walk by the side of the fairways took me into Archer Wood, an ancient piece of English woodland with a very special atmosphere to it. Hidden right in the middle, I saw one of the most beautiful Beech trees ever - do look at the photograph. Crossing the busy A2100 London Road again, I headed across countryside again, through woods and down tiny leafy lanes. Just before Whatlington the path diverts along a little riverbank, with some of the biggest willows I have ever seen. Sitting on a little foot-bridge, eating my sandwiches, I was startled by the sudden appearance of a Mink which came dashing through the undergrowth and leapt on to the bridge. Whether he had smelt the Sandwich Spread, or whether he was just passing through, I don't know, but when he spotted me he leapt straight off the bridge and back into the bushes. I don't know which of us was the more startled! My walk finished by crossing the A21 road, then taking a tiny footpath that follows the water-meadows next to the River Brede, back to Sedlescombe village, and thence to Pestalozzi.

Walk No. 3 - Pestalozzi via Brede to Powdermill Reservoir

Walk No.3 (See on map : See in Gallery), also a total of 20Km, took place a couple of weekends later, once the rainy weather had come to an end. I headed back to the 1066 Country Walk, joining it at the same place as before, but this time I went east, to the village of Westfield. Through pleasant nut woods, then across open fields with fine views of the surrounding countryside. The path went under the railway line near Doleman, affording me a close look at a fine brick bridge, only seen these days by cattle and walkers. Continuing by the side of the pleasant Doleman Ditch, with views of the local swans, I met an elderly walker coming in the other direction. We stopped for a chat, and when he learnt where I had come from, he told me that he was involved in the original survey of land for the buildings at Pestalozzi! Its a small world, sometimes! After a break for lunch, watched by cormorants, I continued on to the quaint village of Brede, which has an imposing old church. Nearby is a beacon, one of a chain of more than 1000 that are sited on high points all over England. Originally designed to warn the countryside of invasion or other catastrophe, they are lit these days to celebrate great national events, such as the Queen's Golden Jubilee or the anniversary of the Battle of Trafalgar. Continuing on over fields and through woodland, I reached the picturesque Wards Wood, which surrounds the Powdermill Reservoir. Unfortunately the reservoir isn't open to the public, and the walk through the woods keeps well away from the water's edge, but the woods are a lovely place in themselves to walk through, with many broad-leaved and coniferous trees to be spotted. One area was obviously a hazel coppice at one time, but now has been left to run to its own devices, which is a pity. I guess there are just too few bodgers around these days. Heading south towards Sedlescombe, I came across a tiny stand of hop poles, with the hop vines growing up the strings in the traditional way. There used to be 1000s of acres of hops grown in the south of England, but these days, like the bodgers, they are few and far between. I finished my walk in the village of Sedlescombe, passing the pub and the village pump, then back across the River Brede to Pestalozzi International Village.

Walk No. 4 - Hastings via Country Park to Covehurst Bay

Walk No.4 (See on map : See in Gallery), a total of 10Km, took place along the cliffs just next to Hastings, my nearest large town. I had had to drive two people to the railway station: Amod, one of the 2nd year students, who was leaving to go to university in Boston, USA, and Alejandra, a Spanish volunteer who had spent the summer at Pestalozzi, helping in Swiss Hall. It seemed a good idea to take advantage of being in Hastings, and go for a walk along the picturesque Saxon Shore Way, another long distance path that runs the 262km from Hastings to Gravesend. This morning, though, I was just to do a few miles of it, as I had to get back to Pestalozzi for luncheon. For a change, I had a companion with me: Prawash Gautam, a Nepali student who had also spent the last 2 years at Pestalozzi and was due to fly to a university at Bremen tomorrow. We set out from the Hastings 'Old Town' with its iconic 'Net Shops'" — these are wooden constructions, weatherboarded and tarred, of various shapes and sizes, used for storage. The buildings were built tall and narrow to avoid payment of ground tax. Hastings has a small funicular railway that takes passengers to the top of the cliffs, but as this was closed for maintenance, we climbed the possibly-hundreds of steps to the top, 111 metres above the sea. The walk continues along the coast, though there is not as much view of the sea as you might expect, due to large bramble patches. This is a popular walk for the locals, especially on such a sunny day as this was, though it is not for the unfit or infirm as the path frequently descends and ascends large numbers of steps when ever a new bay or cove is crossed. Much of the walk is through mixed deciduous woodland, especially in Covehurst Wood, a protected National Park. We continued as far as Covehurst Bay to see the impressive though deserted Coastguard Lookout Station, with its tower of direction-finding and communications aerials and its huge coastal radar installation. Our path then joined the Hastings-link of the 1066 Country Walk, mentioned elsewhere on this page, and thus back across inland fields and footpaths to Hastings Old Town, and our parked car.

Walk No. 5 - Brede High Woods to Robertsbridge

Walk No.5 (See on map : See in Gallery), a total of 27Km, was the longest one so far. With a weekend of driving duties ahead of me, I took the day off on the Friday beforehand. It was a lovely day for a walk - some clouds, and not as hot as it has been recently. Starting at Pestalozzi, I took a footpath that bypasses Sedlescombe village and heads for Lower Jacobs farm, and the suprise sighting of a lama. Continuing north to Brede High Woods again, I took a different path through some atractive woodland cleared of undergrowth, though still no views of the Powdermill Reservoir. Crossing the busy B2089 my walk took me across a picturesque valley to Colliers Green. Bypassing Staplecross, I walked north on tiny footpaths across farmland, orchards, and woodland, to the River Rother. I was hoping to have my luncheon at Robertsbridge Abbey, which is shown on the map as 'Remains of Cistercian Abbey' but this is now in private hands, and doesn't welcome visitors. At nearby Redlands Farm it was nice to see not only a large field of hop poles and hops still present in the English countryside, but also those hops being harvested and then dried and packed into the traditional long hop pockets. Crossing the A21 London Road via a convenient footbridge, I entered Roberstbridge, which a most attractive country town, with some lovely old houses. Unfortunately too many of these are obscured by a multitude of cars parked on every possible bit of road. Roberstbridge was to be the furthest north I would go that day. Leaving it, I crossed under the railway line and took the footpath that runs next to it, past the Darvell community, whose children I could hear playing in the distance. After more woods, the path crossed under the railway line again and headed for Mountfield Court, a beautiful and large country house set on a hilltop, with excellent views over the surrounding parkland. Apparently the house is open to the public occasionally, for charity, but today all was quiet and the house closed. The path passes the large walled garden, once providing food for the big house, though what it is being used for these days is hard to say. The satellite image below shows little activity in the garden, though this may have been a photo taken in the winter-time.

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Leaving Mountfield Court, I walked to the tiny village of Mountfield itself, which has a beautiful country church of All Saints. I spent a bit of time looking both inside and out, then noticing how time was getting on, I carried on across fields to Hoath Wood, and thence to the A2100 London Road, which was busy with evening commuters. The path after this leads through Spring Wood, though the owner would obviously prefer people not to go on this public right of way, as the gates are clearly marked 'No Access'. Obviously most people are put off entering by this, so the path through the woods is little used, though easy enough to follow as it runs along one of the tributaries of the River Line. It reminded me of 'The Wild Wood' from Kenneth Grahame's famous book The Wind in the Willows. Passing a flock of black sheep, I arrived at Whatlington. The rest of my route back to Sedlescombe and the Pestalozzi International village was on familar ground, as it duplicated a walk that I had done before. I arrived back at Swiss Hall just in time for dinner - very welcome after a walk of over 27kms!

I haven't had time to write any details about walk No.6 (See on map : See in Gallery), or walk No.7 (See on map : See in Gallery), as yet, but the maps and galleries are all there, so please take a look, and enjoy the wonderful scenery.

Some background: Digital photos saved in the .jpg or .tif format, as most of them are, have information included with the photos that many people are not aware of. The information is kept in two 'tags' that are embedded in the photo-file itself - the EXIF tag, and the IPTC tag. They can be easily viewed with the right software - more about that later.

Some of the information in the tags is saved automatically by many cameras, and may include details of the type of camera used, the shutter speed, aperture setting, ISO rating, time and date that the photo was taken, etc. Other information can be added manually - this might be such data as the photographer's name, a title or a caption. In the list of EXIF tags there is also a section for GPS position - in other words, the location of the camera when the photo was taken. This opens up all kinds of exciting possiblities, allowing a photo to be allied to an online map or earth-viewer, or to have its position entered to a database which could then be searched according to geographical coordinates, locating, for instance, a photograph nearest to a certain point or place.

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Here's a map of one of my walks. Each marker hides a photo - click on one to see! You can drag the map around, or zoom in and out. All of this is done with geo-code photos !

Why Geo-Tag Photos?

Geo-tagged photos can be used for a number of purposes. These might be:
1/ To show a view of a certain position or location.
2/ To record the position of a particular object or view.
3/ To show the location of views that can be seen whilst proceding from point to point.
4/ To capture the position of a unique event that doesn't normally occur there.

You might combine 1 or more of the above as reasons for geo-tagging your photos. For instance, I take photos on my walks to show people what the countryside around here is like, but I also like taking photos, and keep trying to take better ones. Most, though not all, of my photos try to be photos that stand alone by themselves. If I was just documenting my walks, I would take photos every 100 metres or so, regardless of what the photos came out like. I might also take photos that always looked in the direction I was walking, not to the sides, or behind me.

My photos, once geo-tagged, can be referenced to any mapping system. I can upload those photos to services such as Panoramio or Flickr. My photos carry their position permanently embedded in their EXIF tags. People could even use this data to find where I was at a particular time, or to see the view that I saw for themselves. The possibilities of geo-tagged photos are only just being discovered, but its a sure thing that they will be vital in the future. Protect yourself against image-obsolescence by Geo-Tagging right now!

How to Geo-Tag Photos

To save the location in the embedded EXIF tag of the photo, you can either do it when the photo is taken, or later on, when you are back at your computer.

To do this when a photo is taken, you will need a camera that has these capabilities. Not many do so. One popular model is the Nikon D200, which can be connected either directly to a GPS receiver using home made or purchased cables, or via a BlueTooth link using the RedHen unit and a GPS receiver equipped with BlueTooth. Other cameras include the Canon EOS 1D Mark III, the Fuji S5, Kodak's DC265 and DC290, and the Ricoh 500SE.

Choosing to geo-tag photos once you are back at your computer allows you to use practically any digital camera. You can even geo-tag scanned negatives or tranparencies! First, you will need some software that can accomplish this. Whilst a knowledgeable person could geo-tag with a simple text-editor, it is much more sensible to chose a program designed for the task. Various programs are available: these can be divided into the following categories:

a/ Command Line - Manual Entry
This category assumes that you have a list of coordinates ready to enter in the EXIF tag of each photos. An excellent and well-regarded tool that can do this is ExifTool by Phil Harvey. This program is platform-independent, and performs all manner of tasks to do with reading and writing photo tag-data. It also does it with out degrading the original image - an important point to note when considering a choice of software. The last thing you want is to do a batch-process on your original files and find that they have all been degraded whilst having their tags changed!

The problem with Command-Line entry is that it is not very user-friendly - many people these days prefer a program that will hold your hand a little and monitor what you are doing through a familiar window.

b/ Simple GUI (Graphics User Interface) - Manual Entry
For those who prefer a GUI, there are 2 progams that provide a shell for ExifTool, allowing you to use the same program as above without needing to know or type in a long list of complex commands.
The down-side, though, is that neither program provides the full functionality of ExifTool. Perhaps one day someone will write one, but in the meantime we have these:
1/ExifTool GUI for Windows
2/ExifAuto

c/ Complex GUI - Automatic Entry
The programs above assume you wish to enter the location for each photo from a list. But there are other, more automatic ways of geo-tagging. The first makes use of the popular Google Earth service to identify visually just where the photo was taken, and then grab the coordinates that you need. One program that can do this is Google's Picasa. Here are some tips to help. Alternatively, you can use RoboGeo, which has many facilities in addition to its Google Earth capabilities.

One of these takes automation even further, by tagging a whole folder of photos without the need for you to enter a single latitude or longitude! The way it does it is rather clever. When you set out for your morning photo-shoot, you turn on your GPS receiver, and tell it to create a Track. You then turn on your camera, and check that its internal clock is set to the same tme as the GPS. Having done that, you can put the GPS in your bag or clip it to your belt, and forget about it for the rest of the day. Whenever you snap a photo, your camera will record on the EXIF tag of that image the exact time, to the second, when the photo was taken. When you get back to your computer, you download the Track-file from your GPS. RoboGeo will then check the time that each photo was taken, and unless you are flying a jet-fighter plane, will work out from the Track-file exactly where you were, and write the EXIF location-tags accordingly. Pretty neat, huh ?!

You can use a dedicated GPS receiver made for this job, such as the Sony GPS-CS1KA GPS Location Recorder, which is small enough to hang on your belt-hook un-noticed, or you can use the GPS receiver you already have - for me this is the Garmin GPSmap60cx, which I found at the Global Gizmossite for a very good price.

RoboGeo is not the only software that can geo-tag photos in this way, though I do like its functionality, and its additional capabilities that let it output a Google Map complete with thumbnails (see one of mine here) or a Google Earth .kml file, or even ESRI shapefiles that can be used in more complex display and GIS appplications.

Also worth trying is GPicSync. It is a free download that works with any standard GPS receiver, and has an active user group.

Another program is PhotoMapper, a free GPL licensed GPS Photo-Tagging software application.

Important Points

The above 'automatic' programs rely on a log of your track, stored by a GPS receiver. This track will be composed of a number of tracklog points that record your position as you moved about during the day. In order that you can cross-reference your photos, it is VITALLY IMPORTANT that each point also has a time associated with it. You should be aware that when you Save a track in your Garmin receiver, not only is the time for each point deleted, but also 5 out of every 6 trackpoints are discarded!!! You should also be aware that GPX files, which are a collection of points from a track, DO NOT have the time for each point included, so for the purposes of geo-tagging photos, a .gpx file is USELESS !!! What can be done about this? Well, the only log in your GPS that retains the time for each position is the one called the Active Tracklog. This is the one that you need to use. RoboGeo uses this file when geo-tagging photos, though be aware that the Active Tracklog contains all the tracks you have made recently, and when presented with it, RoboGeo will include all the trackpoints with your map, which is a bit crazy if you only want to use one track. You could of course delete the old Active Tracklog before you start the day's photoshoot, in which case only your new track will be included in the Active Tracklog. Alternatively you can use a program that will let you choose which bit of the Tracklog to include. A useful program that does this is the free DNRGarmin GPS application from the Department of Natural Resources at Minnesota State University. You can easily select the section of the Active Tracklog that you need, and save it as a text-file that RoboGeo will utilise. Lets hope that one day Tim Helton will add this same functionality to RoboGeo itself, plus the ability to see the track on a map, and maybe alter it, before it is used in the tagging process.

Footnotes

You might like to look at the following WikiPedia pages for further ideas:
GeoTagging
Geocoded Photographs