Overlaying Trails Onto Birdseye?

Unfortunately I do not know of a good way to do this.

But can't you display both BirdsEye and the trail map at the same time? What kind of map is the trail map?

I don't see how..the trail would have to be displayed on top of the birdseye images. I guess I'll just use one or the other.

You can display trails on top of Birdseye, but you would have to make a vector-based map of them. You still haven't said what your "very nice trail map" is. Is it a paper map or something in digital format?

You can use a program like Mapwel to load a scan of the paper map for a reference, then trace the trails and turn this into a vector based map. That map can then be sent to the GPS and enabled at the same time as birdseye. If you create the map with a transparent background, it could also be displayed on top of any other Garmin maps, such as City Navigator.

See: http://mapwel.eu/

That's great! As I mentioned, I am proficient in the use of Adobe Illustrator, and vector graphics are what it does best.

My trail map source is a .pdf file from the local government. Nice thing is, I can open the .pdf map in illustrator and edit it directly from the .pdf file.

Do I need the mapwel program or is there a way for me to export the vector file into a format that I can load into Google Earth and follow the tutorial on creating my custom map from there?

No, Google Earth is not really going to help you. There are two basic kinds of maps - raster and vector. KMZ files can contain either type. However the "custom maps" format only supports raster imagery in a .kmz file (in the form of .jpg images). So it doesn't matter if you use Illustrator and create a vector image... you will be at a dead end.

You need a program that compile maps in Garmin's proprietary vector format (.img file). I suggested Mapwel because it's an all-in-one solution that allows you to import a background image, trace and edit vector features, then compile it into an .img file.

There are other ways to do this, such as a combination of GPSMapEdit and cgpsmapper, but they are more complicated and involve using multiple software packages.

Be aware that Garmin does not support any tools to make vector based maps. They consider their format proprietary and have never published it. All of the existing third party tools, like Mapwel and cgpsmapper, have been reverse-engineered without Garmin's blessing. So we're actually pushing the envelope discussing this here, but I wanted to point you in the right direction to accomplish your goal.

Interesting. I wonder if mapwel will accept a vector file and compile it to the garmin format without any tracing? That would be great, but just having this program available is nice enough. I will contact them. Thank you very much

The free demo version is fully functional on your computer, so you can see for yourself. I have never tried importing vector format images in Mapwel (I use Globalmapper which is a powerful and somewhat expensive GIS program).

Mapwel indicates support for .kmz import, so if you can get your illustrator file into .kmz (with Google Earth?) then that might work. I'm not sure whether Mapwel would just rasterize it on import though.

But give it a try. The only limit of the free demo version is that it strips detail out of the garmin .img file that it sends to the GPS. Regardless, you will need to georeference the image, and Mapwel seems to have better tools for that than Google Earth.

BTW, are you aware of the free "MyTrails" overlay? It might already contain what you want: http://www.gpsfiledepot.com/maps/view/53

If not, you can contact the author through the gpsfiledepot forums. He may be willing to add your trails to this project if you can provide him with the data.

I doubt that AI will export to anything vector inexpensive mapping software will accept. The closest would probably be DXF or DWG, but GPSbabel won't convert from either of those formats. The only thing I know that will convert DXF or DWG to DXF or MP is Global Mapper ($400 per seat). Also, does your AI file come with map datum and projection information? This won't matter much if your map is a few miles square, but could matter a lot for something county wide or larger like a US National Park.

I managed to take the .pdf file of the trailmap, dump it into Illustrator, convert all the vector artwork to outline strokes..I'm trying to work with it and will report any success but it's very clumsy and really not worth the aggravation. Would have thought it would have been an easy project but easier would be to leave the garmin at home and bring a paper map.