Backcountry Navigator offline map recommendation?

[Trikebubble]

We are going to be travelling from BC to Colorado at the end of the month and I am trying to figure which offline map source ro save. Our travels will be split between highways and byways, and offroad where it may interest us. We are heading from our home in the Okanagan Valley to the Missoula area to meet friends, then convoying to Colorado Springs, likely via the Ouray area.
I have a dedicated Garmin for on highway travel, as well as Here and Sygic apps on my tablet with offline maps saved.

I have been looking at the US map choices in Backcountry Navigator and so fsr the USGS Topomaps seems to provide the clearest and best details.
Any thoughts or opinions or experiance as to which mapsource may work best for me to save for offline use?



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[1Louder]

If USFS Raster maps are available those are my favorite. In Gaia I use two layers. Typically one is Google road and the other Raster.

 

[theksmith]

like the previous poster, i usually take the approach of loading at least 2 map styles for any area i'm visiting, an overview/road source to zoom level 13 or 14, and a highly detailed topo source to level 15. in BCN, those would be:

- "CalTopo US 24K Topo Maps": great detail with many historical mines and other POIs as well as old "Jeep trails" that may no longer even exists. all this info can be confusing though, so if you want something a little simpler try the "US Forest Service" maps which are from around 2013 and also provided by Caltopo in BCN (only available in NF areas though).
- "Worldwide Open Street Map - Mapquest": a decent overview/road map. if you're tech savvy, learn how to add your own map source to the list and use Yahoo (now called HERE) maps. they are similar to Mapquest but clearer color scheme and more importantly they get the forest service and small county roads correct most of the time (whereas Mapquest is terribly outdated with those).

 

[Kerensky97]

I like the CalTopo maps because they're basically the same thing as USGS topo but with shading so it's easier to see the topography at a glance.

 

[87Warrior]

I have had good luck with the USGS Topo and the US Forest Service maps where available. I'd really like to layer maps in BCN but I don't that that is possible. It is quick and easy to switch out which base map you need as long as you saved all offline maps in the same folder.

 

[bigreen505]

Not sure what your Colorado plans are, but try this for the Garmin: http://www.gpsfiledepot.com/maps/view/197/