Gps - Google Earth Tips

Gps Babel

To be able to transfer data back and forth between your GPS and Google Earth you need to change your GPS file format (mine is .gdb Garmin MapSource) to Google Earth format .kml (Keyhole Markup Language) and .kml to your GPS File Format.

Gps Babel is a program that will do this for you. It is free at Gps Babel Download.

As an Example say I want to snowshoe from my condo to Two John lake (actually I have walked this route):

Under Google Earth

1. Right Click My Places and choose Add->Folder giving it a name like 2John
2. Use the Add Placemark button to add a number of points you want to go thru.

3.Right click the folder name (2John) and choose "Save Place As", choose a directotory like C:\TEMP and save as a .kml (2John.kml)
4.Run GPSBabelGui.exe
in the input selection choose Google Earth (Keyhole) Markup Language (.kml) and browse for the file you saved.
in the output section choose your GPS file type ( in my case - Garmin MapSource - gdb (.gdb) ) and enter an output file name, then press lets go.
5.Run your GPS software (in my case Mapsource) and load the GPS file. I normally use the Route tool in Mapsource and join the point together generating a Route.