Pootler

NB. This review is now several years old, and I now rarely update it. The apps themselves get updated. In some cases, my gripes have been addressed, and I am acutely aware that some features that I regarded as superfluous are now widely accepted and used. I have also stopped creating new routes. The amount of effort required to write and edit the kind of historical and landscape detail that I would want to see is increasingly unrewarded in the profile accorded to them by the apps, which are now more nakedly commercial and heavily focused on algorithmically generated junk and the raw sewage of 'community' uploads.   For years, I used the excellent 'Viewranger' app for maps, but this was swallowed up years ago in a scaling-up exercise by Outdooractive, a German company.  I applied four main criteria in searching for a replacement app. Ideally, it should: Give you good quality maps, preferably usable offline,  Allow me to upload my routes, and for you to access them....

Link to the GPX File   Nasty, Romans & Vogons Why the comma in the title of this ride? Think 'Have you eaten Grandma'? The route starts from Knebworth Station and then runs clockwise to the east of Stevenage, on quiet, gently undulating roads around the East Hertfordshire Plateau. (You could as easily start from Stevenage, if you don’t mind the town traffic!). It crosses the River Rib and (Roman) Ermine Street at Buntingford and beyond that follows the River Quin south to Braughing, before turning West to return to Knebworth via Stapleford. The varied landscape is a microcosm of the changes in the agricultural and village landscape since Medieval times. Zooming In Highlights are: The post mill in Cromer. You won’t see many of those! Locations used in the 2005 film of 'Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Arthur Dent's house and the local pub, where he is drinking when the planet is blown up. A hamlet named 'Nasty'. You c...

  Link to GPX File of the Route   NB. The bridge at Temple Lock on this route has been closed (Sept '24). I will add an amendment to the route a.s.a.p. This route covers two landscapes, the Thames Valley and the Chiltern Hills. From Twyford Station, you head east across flat arable land before turning north and crossing the higher ground bordering the current course of the river. Descending, you cross the river at a lock, then climb around 100m to the wooded hills overlooking the beautiful valley of the Hamble Brook. After following this for a few miles, you coast down the hillside side and then along the valley road to Hambleden itself before recrossing the Thames at the eponymous lock. Leaving the south bank, you cross the valley side again before returning to Twyford. For the most part the route follows minor roads, but there is an avoidable stretch of about a mile of woodland path south of the Thames on the return leg. See ‘Route Tips’ below. The River is crossed at pi...

  GPX File of the Route   Midsomer & Medieval Murders This route uses minor roads and the Phoenix Trail to explores the Aylesbury Vale and some attractive old villages which were used as settings for the documentary series ‘Midsomer Murders’. It starts at Princes Risborough Railway Station. The initial 3 mile stretch to Chinnor is on a well used B Road and then turns north then west to continue towards Ewelme on quieter back roads. At Ewelme it pivots back to head for Thame on a more northerly route, passing through Chalgrove and the Haseleys before crossing the River Thame at Shabbington. From Thame it returns to Prices Risborough on the Phoenix Trail, a converted railway line.  There are some homeopathic climbs, the highest point being just 124m (near  Postcombe) and the lowest is around 40m. For more detail see the Route Tips. Zooming In Highlights are:   The ‘Midsomer Murders’ Villages. Almost every village here claims to have appeared in in...