Ok guys... Jay and I have been on a couple backpacking trips in the past month and have utilized the app called "Backcountry Navigator Pro". This app is KILLER for a hiking GPS app.
The first trip we used it on was in the desolation wilderness. We found ourselves hiking for 2 miles ontop of 10 ft of snow. No trail but no problem. With this app you can download certain areas of the state. Simply drag and click the area for which you want offline maps. You can pick from Aerials or Topo's from mytopo.com. Pick was zoom level you want to download and wala! Offline topo's and aerials with zoom. With the phone on flight mode and the GPS on, we were able to zoom in on our location from the map we downloaded prior and found ourselves 50ft above the trail. The gps was dead on!
Our trip this last weekend found us hiking for 4 hours and 7 miles in the dark. Once the app has your position aquired you can choose to start "tracking" your trip. You can name specific trips for use again as well. With this app we were able to make sure we took the right forks during dark and navigate the right creek crossings and we even used the topo feature to map out where we wanted to look for a campsite in the dark!
Each trip we have used it on had the trails designated on the map for easy navigation. Our next trip this weekend brings us to lakes which have no trails leading to them. This will be a new test for this app. The app offers a free version (trial) that gives you all or most of the features for 16 days, then you have to buy it. But the cost is only 9.99... thats it!
You can do searches for different areas, lakes, mountains, etc and create way points as well! This is an awesome app guys! Can't say enough about it. I have a Samsung Captivate that I use it on. With flight mode on and the GPS on, I could do a full days hike and check the map a couple times every hour and go through a battery every day and a half. Definitely worth checking out for all the hiking enthusiast!
