FATMAP

I blogged about Gaia GPS several times. It was my go-to offroad / hiking navigation app, mostly because it was offering offline topographic map downloads from variety of sources. But Gaia has had its quirks. It has not been the most easy and intuitive to use and the Android version (although having much progress recently) was lagging behind the iOS one.

But now there is the new kid on the block - FATMAP. Although the name sounds weird and coming out of nowhere, the company behind it is Strava, which is very well known by people who do any kind of physical exercise, including trail running and hiking.

FATMAP adds this shiny polish on the original concept of Gaia. Seamless visualization of terrain, super responsive user interface, seamless offline support, accurate maps from multiple sources, GPX track uploads, and last but not least - full integration with other activity tracking and planning cloud services such as Garmin.com.

I had a chance to put FATMAP to the test when visiting Azores about two weeks ago. It had all trails precisely updated and allowed me to experience wonderful trail runs in the total wilderness of the incredible cliffs and mountains. After a day or two I had full confidence up to the point that one day I decided to navigate a forest thinning which was completely covered by giant burdocks, reaching heights of 2-3 meters. I followed the FATMAP guidance up to the point where it was showing a potential path into less dense woods - and here it was. After a recorded track (it records on my Garmin watch) seamlessly synchronized, there was a very nice option of "fly over" it, to give a great overview of the covered terrain.

Both Gaia and FATMAP - to have full benefits - are subscription - based apps. I was a paying Gaia subscriber for many years. Now I have switched to FATMAP, as it feels like a better overall package.