Garmin Copper Canyon Maps Updated

Update 25Jan14: I have finished the updates to the maps based on the last years worth of intel I've received. There is no longer a waypoints file included as I've moved all the waypoints onto the map itself, so now if you want to go to a town you search for it just like you would any other town when using maps you purchase from Garmin. The map is still not routable so it will still just point you in the direction of your destination and not follow the roads... That was still too much work. To download the maps go to my website linked below.

http://dajuice.net/maps/copper-canyon-mx/

Original Post Below:
**********************************************************************************************

Hello inmates! A group of my friends have been making the trip to the Copper Canyon region of Mexico for several years. CWC had compiled their tracks into a Garmin compatible custom map of the area using cgpsmapper and GPSMapEdit. His original threads about this can be found here and here. That map was last updated with 2010 tracks and since the roads in that region tend to move an update was due. Because I apparently needed a challenge I decided to take over the updates and after annoying the crap out of CWC for a couple months I have a product that might pass as useful containing updates from 2011 and 2012 trips.

Here is the area the map covers:


It starts in Presidio, TX in the northeast and down to Topolobompo in the southwest covering most of the best roads in the copper canyon region. The yellow lines in the pic indicate pavement and the dashed lines indicate non-paved ranging from well maintained gravel to poorly maintained doubletrack.

Here is an overlay of the track used to create the map in GE to show the detail. The GE imagery is at 5000 feet elevation and its showing the switchbacks on the road to Batopilas that comes from the north.



The map is transparent so it can be added on top of any map you have installed on your GPS. I've created an executable file to install the maps into mapsource and can be sent to your GPS like any other map from Garmin. If you have both mapsource and basecamp installed it will also show up in basecamp. These will not work with a mac although I have instructions on how to make it work with a mac if anyone wants to take that on. Let me know.

The map is not routable, meaning if you say you want to go from town A to town B, it is going to show you the route as the crow flys. I'm starting to experiment with making this map routable for the next version.

This text deleted: There is also a gdb file of waypoints as the map itself is mainly just roads. I've got a few towns in the map itself for testing purposes and the next version of this should have may more POI's contained in the map itself.

Note that these maps are in continuous need of updates as they work on the roads in the region. I know currently one of the best sections of roads in the set, from Creel to Batopilas, is currently under construction and is several years from completion. There are threads discussing the status of this road and others in the region so prior to departure, please check the current reports.

[Links to old version removed from post]

All of these roads have been verified by a member of the group of riders I've traveled with personally except one that is just a track created by tracing on Google Earth. That is west of Norogachi and the road is marked at either end as "Track not verified!" and is shown as red when viewed in mapsource.

I plan to continue updating this map so if you have new/updated tracks or POI's, please let me know and I'll get it incorporated into the next version of the map.

CWC has a website with a lot of additional information about the map such as ride time and info on how to get insurance and import your bike... That is located here: http://home.earthlink.net/~ccoonswp/MexLinks.htm

Here are two video's from the 2012 trip. The 1st is video from my helmet cam and the 2nd is a slideshow of pics from several people's cameras:

<iframe src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/kcZNV13BwUo?rel=0" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" width="560"></iframe>

<iframe src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/rSMjlubRXdY?rel=0" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" width="560"></iframe>

I have found this community to be a wealth of knowledge that has contributed to a lot of fun on two wheels for myself. This is my attempt to give a little back... enjoy!

Hats off for the time involved to put all the info together. CWC's efforts are commendable on the websight. I've bookmarked it for reference. In this day and age of GPS's a .gdb file of the tracks would be awesome?

Yeah, he has a lot of patience!

I actually don't have a clean copy of all the unfiltered tracks but I can give you what I have, PM me.

Awesome Dajuice, very generous. Thank you.

Looking for off road tracks to get me into Guatemala, I'll take whatever ya got, Pm inbound.

Info sent. Enjoy your trip, hopefully you can put some of this to use. I think the Copper Canyon region should be on everyone's bucket list. My friends are down there right now... can't wait until next year when I can afford to join them again.

Thanks for the hard work. I have used CWC's map before, and they have been great. I noticed that you show Parrel as a point of interest. If it is not too far South for your map, I have a track from Guanacevi to the South to Parrel that is mostly dirt, and then the paved highway from Parrel to the canyon lookout near Guachochi Where we picked up your route down to batopilas. You are welcome to them if they will be any help.

Absolutely I'll send you a PM. Thx!

E mail sent
I hope they are of some use

I wish I had your map back in 2006 when I rode through there. I had only the base world Garmin map and two paper maps that didn't match each other. It was an adventure to be sure. Locals always gave different directions and time estimates.

Thanks for the hard work.

Thanks... here begins my list of things to update for the 2013 version

I found it funny when the few roads that did exist in the Garmin basemap would show the road I was on be a few miles east of where I really was

About the locals, I think they assume everyone on two wheels is Ryan Dungey when they give time estimates. I also learned that when the locals tell you it is possible to get a cell phone signal at the top of the canyon they must really be wondering if I'm dumb enough to believe them. Tury (who is from Chihuahua city) and I spent a day trying to get a signal stopping every 2 miles to check our phones... I see people walking around with cell phones so they must work, right?

Exactly, no matter where you were going it was 3 hours by car, and 2 by motorcycle! Usually meant 5-7 hours! And they would not necessarily know the correct road but had no problem sending down the wrong one. I think they were just trying to be polite.

I have used the 2009 and 2010 CWC maps. Were very handy. So will update to the 2012.
Thanks for your vid and pics were great.
I thought I recognised Arturo in there. Have ridden with him a couple of times over the years, a really knowledgeable guy to have for the area.

What time of the year did you do the trip?

For the first time in many years I hit rain last October going down to Bato. You don't want to have rain!!! No No.

Being snow locked like you, this is a trip my friends in the area have been doing in the latter part of winter.

I only went for the 1st time last year and didn't get any rain but have heard the polvo is real fun after a rain! I understand the plan is to find cerveza and when it rains.

Hey, not sure what I am doing wrong but the map is just a big white square. The waypoints imported just fine though. Do I need to do something else withing Basecamp to see the map?

I'm not in a place where I can get to a computer for a day or so and don't know basecamp real well. Have you tried to zoom in or set the detail level to highest?

Briefly, yeah but I haven't gone at it hard yet. I am going to work on it tonight and see what I can figure. No big hurry, just getting started on the map work for the trip in March.

I appreciate all the work you put into this though. I am pretty good with computers and such so if you need some help I'll put my offer out there.

Michael

Ok, got the map working now. Is it true that you can't overlay this map in Basecmap only in the GPS. I swear Garmin is trying as hard as they can to drive people away....

M

It is true that you can only show one map product in basecamp at a time as far as I'm aware. Did you get the map to show anything except a white square in basecamp? If not, there is a detail level toolbar you get by going to tools - toolbars - detail level. Turn up the detail level until you see something on the map. I just set mine to highest. By default Basecamp is set to medium and you won't see anything on this map on that setting until you are zoomed into 15 miles.

Kinda new to this stuff. Do you guys recommend purchase of a base map? If so, which one? I have the City Navigator which includes Mexico. I have been looking at the Garmin/Bici Topo map. Using Montana, travelling to CC and then to Baja and back north to AZ. Big bikes so only mild dirt this trip. Although I would like to get topo or something for future small bike trips to Baja. I am familiar with the 24k topos for the US.

Thanks