iphone map caching for international travel?

[lefebeaver]

Hi all,

I'm going on a liveaboard trip in a few weeks, and being a curious geo-geek I'd like to have access to Google maps or the like while on the water to orient myself to the surrounding landscape features. I'm looking for the best way to cache images or maps on my iphone for the region I'll be diving, for offline use. I probably won't have a data signal for most of the trip, but even if I do, I don't want to pay international roaming charges.

Last year I had minimal success with Trimble's app; it allows caching but resolution is very limited, and it's difficult to know for sure whether what you've cached is even useful until your phone's GPS puts you in the scene. I hear the new IOS mapping app has caching capability, but haven't been able to find any info on how to set this up.

I'd welcome any stories, successful or not, about other's attempts at this sort of thing.

thanks

 

[altaskier]

I use MotionX-GPS for the iPhone. Works great without any data connection. Before you go, get on a WiFi connection and you can download either road or terrain maps; see MotionX® | MotionX ® | FAQ & Support and click on Map Downloads. They also make a road navigation version (MotionX® | MotionX News » MotionX-GPS Drive) which lets you download maps good for spoken driving directions.

If you land in a new region and don't have any data connection (like WiFi) it can take a few minutes to figure out your GPS location the first time, but then you're good to go in that region.

 

[lefebeaver]

Thanks altaskier. I've been using motionX for years as a basic GPS but always off the grid so never used their map features - didn't realize they were hosting map caching, so its a pleasant surprise and a but embarrassing to learn the solution was already loaded on my phone! I've already downloaded the region of my upcoming trip. Thanks for the tip! Now I'll cache maps of the remote regions I work as well.

 

[Doc]

I keep screen shots loaded onto "camera roll".