Rent Recording Equipment
Being able to offer visitors a nearby cycling or hiking route can increase the destination’s appeal and encourage visitors to stay longer. Destination Glasriket has invested in a Garmin GPS Map that can be used to record a digital file of a loop or to upload the route to, for example, Naturkartan. It is available to borrow free of charge for anyone who is interested.
Receiving recommendations for nearby hiking or biking trails is greatly appreciated. It’s a tip you can share with visitors you meet—or suggest as an outing idea to visitors on your website. Providing information about a suggested route might be what convinces a visitor to come to you specifically.
In this context, Naturkartan is a great place to post trails and hikes, as it makes them easily accessible. It’s a place where you can post a link showing the recorded trail along with its route on the map.
A few suggestions:
- If you run a lodging facility, it may be helpful to offer a few different suggested itineraries for visitors who want to go on an excursion on foot or by bike.
- If you run a café or restaurant, the combination of a coffee-and-pastry or lunch package and a suggested itinerary could be appealing.
- No matter how you go about your bike rides, it's a great service to provide a bunch of suggested routes in your area.
- If you run a retro or thrift store, you might want to create a bike tour that takes riders past your store and nearby, similar businesses. It could be a short themed tour, perhaps with a stop at a café along the way.
The points above are just a few of many ideas, and really, the only limit here is your imagination.
Things to keep in mind:
- When planning a bike ride in your area, make sure to choose only roads that are not private. Avoid major, heavily trafficked roads. If the route includes private roads or forest machine trails, you’ll need permission from the landowner.
- A hiking trip is much the same. Feel free to take advantage of our wide selection of gravel roads. Nature trails in the forest, private roads, or roads for forestry machinery require permission from the landowner.
Gravel roads are a hallmark of our region, particularly in Småland and Norrland. These areas have a wide variety of gravel roads that are not private. And there are many wonderful things to discover along these winding, picturesque gravel roads. They are a resource for us and an attraction for visitors.
If you know of any suitable trails in your area that could be used to create a hiking or biking route, please contact us at Destination Glasriket. We’d be happy to lend you our Garmin GPS so you can record the route, and we can then add it to Naturkartan.
We've also put together a simplified user guide that comes with the equipment when you borrow it. If you'd like to get a sense right now of just how easy it is to record a tour, you can take a look at it here.
A Simplified Guide to Garmin GPS
We're also happy to serve as a sounding board and offer a few tips before it's time for you to do the actual recording.
Here’s a link to what’s currently available on Naturkartan for Glasriket. Maybe there’s already a tour near you that you can recommend to your visitors—whether when you meet them in person or as a suggestion on your website.