I've been trying to get the bugs worked out of my route-finding using my new Garmin eTrex Legend HCx on my bike.
My first GPS was an older B&W eTrex and it worked great for showing saved tracks and the active track. Setting it up was very simple and intuitive. After I lost that unit I had two other receivers that I did not like, so I got this one to be back to using an eTrex. Setup is a bit more complicated, but I've been really focusing on it and experimenting.
This weekend I had a couple failed experiments, and I'm trying to understand what went wrong.
Prior to an exploration ride Saturday I loaded up two saved tracks that I had drawn by hand in TF. They were very simple tracks, one was probably 20 points and the other might have been as many as 80-100. I uploaded them with TF, then checked in the Tracks menu to be sure that "Show on Map" was checked for each.
Now, what I want and remember having with my old unit, was that all I had to do was page to the normal map screen and I would see the saved tracks and/or the active track.
Out on the ride, when I encountered the first one, I think I was able to see it, and see that I was on it. But I was having some backlighting issues, so in the bright sunlight I wasn't seeing the screen very clearly. But I'm pretty sure it was there. But it was the 2nd one that was really critical. When I got to where I should have started following that track, nothing was there. It got me to wondering if I hadn't done something wrong, but I was pretty sure (like 99%) that I had gotten to where that track should have started.
I stood around on the road messing around with the unit, including removing the first saved track so that only one was loaded. I was wondering if maybe having two tracks loaded was screwing me up (my old Edge 205 was only able to show one track at a time if I recall). Eventually I gave up and just went on from memory of my map study the night before and then check what I actually did against the track on TF. But I couldn't go very far because I didn't want to get lost.
Well, I was able to confirm that I was on the hand-drawn track. But it wasn't visible. Furthermore, the ride I did was a lollipop, but when I rejoined my outbound route I could not see the active log track either.
So that night I went into the setup, fixed the backlighting setting that was making everything too dim to read, and then drew a very simple track, maybe 10 points, and uploaded it. Again, I checked to be sure "show on map" was checked. This was a known ride, so I didn't need the track for route-finding, but just wanted to see if it showed up.
Could not see it when I knew I was on it. Also, when I rejoined my outbound route, I could not see the active track that I was retracing.
I have basemaps loaded, so I'm seeing topo data. Could that actually be screwing me up? I never loaded any basemaps with my original eTrex receiver. The behavior of that unit is exactly what I was hoping for when I got this one.
Now, if I go into the menu->tracks->select track and click the "map" button, it shows. But is that what I really need to do? Why is there a checkbox for "Show on Map" if you have to click the Map button to see the track? And why isn't my active track showing?
Thanks in advance for any help. I usually prefer to figure these things out myself, but I need to resume the route-finding task that I was forced to abandon Saturday, I'm hosting an event and I need to prove out a route before publishing the event GPX. And the clock is ticking on me.
