Pattaya Area Hash Trail History

The instructions below are how to use the trail history on the GE desktop version for selecting a trail area and designing a trail for your run.

Before planning your run, download the latest version of the KMZ file.

After downloading the KMZ file, double click the file to open it in GE. Once opened you will see the file as All Trails.kmz in Temporary Places. To permanently save it in GE you’ll need to right click All Trails.kmz and select Save to My Places. If you have a previous copy of All Trails.kmz in GE, delete the older version first.

By default, the last four years of trail history is visible along with the Hare Advisory info. Trails for runs that occurred in the last four months are in yellow, all other trails are blue. You can use the color difference to select an area for your run that hasn’t been used recently.

Once you’ve selected an run area, zoom into that area to find either an a-site that has been used before, or a new location for your a-site.

Add Trail Folder

To begin the trail design process, right click on My Places and select Add/Folder. A good naming convention for your folder is using the date of your run as a prefix. Use the format of YYYY-MM-DD as a prefix so multiple trail folders can be easily sorted into date order.

Add A-Site Location

Create an icon for your start point. You can either copy an existing a-site placemark and paste it into your run’s folder. Or create a new placemark by clicking on the yellow push pin icon.

When creating new placemarks or trails, you’ll need to use cut and paste on the created object to get it into your run’s folder.

Designing A Trail

For designing the trail, use GE’s Path tool. That tool can be accessed by clicking the vertical ruler icon at the top of the screen. When the Ruler is open, click on the Path tab. Then it’s just a matter of clicking on the GE map starting at your selected a-site, with subsequent clicks laying down points along the trail you want to use in the direction you want the runners to follow. Once the trail has been mapped out, click Save on the Ruler dialog box.

A New Path dialog box will open. Enter a name for your trail such as “Trail v1”. In the Style, Color tab, select a color for the trail (recommend bright green: #00ff00). Set the Width to 4.0 and click Ok. Most times the new path will appear under Temporary Places, so remember to cut and paste the trail object into your run’s folder or you’ll lose your work when you close GE.

When designing your trail, easiest is to use past trails when laying out your trail using the path tool. Follow the blue, older trails and avoid as much as possible the more recent, yellow trails.

These next steps are for getting your new trail on to a GPS device that you can then use to recce and set trail from.

The first step is to right click on your trail’s folder and select Save Places As. Change the Save As Type to Kml.

The KML file can then either be imported into Google My Maps (link), or your GPS device’s application software.

For Google Maps select Create A New Map and then in the new map dialog box click on Import and upload your KML trail file.

Instructions for loading a GPS device vary by manufacture. Here are the steps for a Garmin device.

The first step is to convert the KML file into a GPX file format that the Garmin application can read. One free site that can do this is KML2GPX (link).

Once the KML file has been converted and downloaded to your local drive, double click the GPX file to open it in the Garmin application. In the application, change the track properties for color to green as that shows up best on the GPS device. Then send the trail info to your GPS device.

When walking the trail, use your GPS to log where you go. As you walk it’s also a good idea to mark waypoints that you think would make for good locations for checks or backchecks.

After you walk the trail, transfer the GPS track on the device to the application and save it as a gpx or gdb file.

Open GE and select File/Open. In the Open dialog box, select from the drop down list Gps (*.gpx, *.gdb) file type, then open your saved gpx/gdb file. In the next dialog box that opens you’ll need to check the box for Create KML LineStrings.

Drill down the folders of the file you opened in GE to get to the object that is the path of the trail you walked. Cut and paste that path object into your trail folder. If you marked any waypoints, cut and paste the waypoints folder into your trail folder as well.

Using the trail you logged on the walk, adjust your original planned trail to match what you walk. Suggest making a copy of the original trail design, name the copy “Trail v2” and adjust that trail.

Another suggestion is to preplan your checks and backchecks on the final version of the trail before you go out to lay paper. Displaying the old trails on GE can help find locations where multiple trails branch off in different directions, which makes for good checks. A good rule of thumb is try to keep checks and backchecks about 700m - 800m apart.

One other thing to watch out for is pinch points in your trail where the on out and on in trails are close together. It’s easy to see these pinch points on GE and by using the Ruler tool you can measure how close together the trails are. Another good rule of thumb is to avoid having trails come any closer than 350m to each other. Also avoid setting checks where trails are close together.

PH3 Trail Markings

Paper

Paper will be laid at regular intervals allowing the trail to be followed. It will either be hanging strips, which will be stapled at the sides of the trail (preferably one side only). Alternatively, the paper will be shredded and laid on the ground.

Checks

Checks will be 2 sticks (normally painted RED) on the ground in the form of a cross. A good handful of paper is often left under checks so that the true trail can be marked by those breaking the check.

Once trail is found, these sticks are pointed towards true trail.

Back Checks

If there are any Back Checks, then they will be 2 parallel sticks, normally painted BLUE.

Once true trail is found, these sticks are pointed towards true trail.

False Trails

Any False Trails will be marked in painted sticks on the ground to form the letters “FT” (normally RED)

Walkers / Runners Split

On most PH3 runs the hares go to the effort to lay a walkers trail. The split is usually clearly marked in painted sticks in the form of an “R” and a “W”.

On In

PH3 tradition is to paint "On In" on a dirt surface about 200 to 300 m from the A-Site.

IMPORTANT: Never paint rocks, trees or any man-made surface.