Four Walks in Austria

The geeky bit

Daystreaming

My plan is to do some daystreaming. This isn't daydreaming, it isn't live streaming, it's finding a way (network permitting) to send lots of little updates about what's going on all the time so I and anyone else can sort of play my day back after the event.

There will be a semi-live map on the home page which will show the places I've been in the last 30 minutes. I've written a little Android app which sends my GPS position every 3 minutes. The map is centered on the mean of the last 10 positions the app records. Obviously if I'm taking a rest, or having lunch, or measuring something, or just looking at the view, I won't have moved far or not at all.

GPS and (lack-of) speed trails

I'll be recording trails of the walks in two different ways which will be downloadable after I've finished the walk. I'll be using an iPhone app and also a small GPS logger. My velocity, for want of a better word, will be captured using Nike+. I'm aiming to make my GPS trails Google Earth aware so that the lovely countryside can be enjoyed vicariously while sitting on the sofa with something chilled. It's all a bit of an experiment though.

Countdown timers

Just to add a bit of suspense to a gentle amble, there will be a countdown timer to the train I'm aiming to catch that day. Most of the walks end in a nice train ride back to the hotel, so it'll be good to have something to aim at.

Gadgets

Obviously, because it's me, I'm not going for a small walk in the country empty handed. Oh no, that'd be far too restrained. This is what I'll be taking to record what I see on my walk and hopefully report a bit back on the experience.

	Wintec G Rays 2 Logger Should capture the most accurate trail data. Camera clock synced to UTC so that it will match the clock on this. The trails coming out of this and HoudahGeo will be Google Earth-tastic I hope.
	iPhone 3GS Will be running AudioBoo, a custom web Twitter client with a low footprint (to cut down on network costs) and a copy of EveryTrail which should allow me to upload a trail as soon as the walk is over and embed it in the site.
	Android Google Ion Developer phone from Google I/O. Will be running the home brewed FourWalks app which allows me to send live GPS positions, tweets, waypoints and other good stuff. Slightly battery hungry, so...
	Freeloader Battery Pack and Solar Charger Will be charged up over night every night and the solar panels will hopefully charge bits of kit during lunch breaks.
	Nike+ USB watch Sadly doesn't let you hook the Nike+ files off as a storage device, but actually a really nice little time/distance tracker. Has been great in training.
	Flip Minio HD Small, perfectly formed and HD for recording panoramas and the occasional Ellen McArthur video diary entry (with less tears I hope).
	Pentax 1st DS Entry level digital SLR, takes reasonable pictures, nice and light for this sort of stuff. Armed with 2 4Gb memory cards.
	Long tape measure For measuring buildings so I can make very small, perfectly formed models of them.
	Old skool A notepad and pencil. Nuff said. Luxury item.