I’ve mentioned this before, but I’m being more direct about it now. There are many people who sing the praises of Cachetur. In a general sense, I’m one of them. It’s an incredibly powerful tool for trip planning and I’m glad something like it exists for serious trip planners (I said as if I do not fall into that category). But it doesn’t really do the job for me. Why? Strangely enough, because it’s a little too powerful at what it does. So, I’m in the middle of planning a significant road trip for future date, one longer than any I’ve taken thus far. I’ve been playing around with routes and maps for quite a while, significantly changed routes at least twice, switched approaches to important things multiple times and ways… Traditionally, I’ve used Bing Maps for this. Before about six months ago, I could set up a map for 25 locations as opposed to the big free map programs that could only do ten. About six months ago, Bing went down to 15; better than the average, but a significant decline for my purposes. I get that I can’t expect a dedicated navigator to plot my course when I’m using a free service, but fifteen is just too little. Further, while I’m really good at estimating how long these trips will take, beyond a certain time and distance, I can’t be counted on entirely. I can plan for weirdness over a few days, but beyond a certain point, my assumptions can leave hours of time over- or under-used, leaving me to play things by ear a little more than I might like. There are routing websites that can go far beyond 15, but I don’t want to pay for them. Yes, it’s a small amount (sub-$10 [which some cachers would consider highway robbery, but that’s a discussion for a different day]), but I don’t want to spread my card number out farther than I have to. So I decided to give Cachetur another try. Maybe I missed something the first time?
NO, I didn’t. To begin with, it’s still as powerful as I mentioned before. I’m lining up my locations and I’m well past 30, but here’s my problem: as you all know, I always visit the county courthouse or equivalent whenever I go to a county. If I was using Google or Bing Maps, I could enter “XXX County Courthouse” and it would usually get me there with little problem (to be fair, they have routed me to annexes, auxiliary offices, and, on one occasion, the county jail). I don’t have that option with Cachetur. For every single courthouse, I have to find the coordinates on my own for it. I feel this defeats the purpose of using it if I have to crack open Google Maps to get the coordinates and then enter them separately. For caches, this isn’t a problem; if I tell Cachetur that I’m going to a cache, it routes to it with no issue as I would expect for a caching centric website. So you might be thinking “Atreides, why not just route to the cache closest to the courthouse?” to which I would respond “That’s not the point!” If I was only concerned with the cache nearest the courthouse, that would be great and sometimes I am. But what if I want a certain type and it’s not right there? What if the closest one isn’t one I want to mess with (a 5/4 Mystery, an eight-stage Multi, a Walking Tour Virtual)? That leaves me cluttering up my route with caches I have no intention of touching and leaving off important stops. And believe me, if I don’t get that courthouse, I do not count it and have to go back! You may not know it but I ave four counties I have caches in but don’t count (two in Arizona, one in Rhode Island, and one in Vermont) because I haven’t been to their counties’ courthouses. But this also applies to anything else! Do I want to stop at a restaurant? Find the coordinates! Hotel? Find the coordinates? Any specific address? Find the flippin’ coordinates! It’s making me wonder why I don’t just get a paper map and some pencils! Surely there’s got to be a way to make this thing more user friendly. I mean, it’s should be good for more than just caching, right? I get they’ve been making updates and fixes lately and that may or may not have impacted performance, but I still have the feeling that my specific issues are not on their minds.
Oh, Cachetur, I really want to like you more than I do. I see so many possibilities in you if I was a different cacher than I am…
