Tracks4Africa specials during lockdown

[Lizette Swart]

Make use of the excellent discounts on Tracks4Africa products (https://shop.tracks4africa.co.za/) during the lockdown period in South Africa. Note that delivery of the physical products such as paper maps, books and SD cards will only take place once the lockdown has ended, but that downloadable products can be purchased and downloaded now. Further information from Johann Groenewald (Groenie on the forum), owner of Tracks4Africa, below:

This message is for all hodophiles (lovers of roads). While hodophobes* may be quite content with our current constraints, I am anxiously aware of all travel restrictions while we deal with Covid-19. What to do in the downtime? Plan a road trip!

If you love the road and can't wait to get back out there, then I have good news for you. You can now buy our downloadable, Garmin compatible maps at lockdown prices. This is not a Black Friday deal to boost our numbers, this is our way of keeping all staff on board and paying salaries for the unforeseeable future.

Since we cannot ship any physical products and all our retail outlets are closed for sales, we expect quite a big delay before our cashflow will return to normal. I have made sure that we have spare cash for a rainy day, but I am afraid this is no ordinary rainy day and it might become a rainy quarter.

So I am slashing the prices of products which we can sell right now in order to give you a great deal. These are the maps you need for planning that longed-for African road trip. And in buying these maps now, you will be helping us tremendously during a very uncertain time.

Your lockdown deal
Our downloadable maps, which cover the entire African continent, usually cost R900 for a one-year subscription. You can get the year's subscription for R300 during the lockdown. If you have bought this product before, you will receive a further 50% discount, which means you can now get the GPS Africa maps for R150.

I have also introduced a five-year subscription option for the above maps, which would normally retail for R1,750. During lockdown we are discounting the five-year subscription to R875. If you want to get access to our latest maps for five years uninterrupted, then this is the most affordable way ever.

What do we mean by subscription? Our Garmin compatible maps never expire, so you can use them for as long as you have them, but the subscription entitles you to map updates during the time of your subscription. For downloadable maps we release four updates per year. You can download these from your user profile on our website and our staff is on standby to assist you if you need any help in doing so.

Plan now, travel later
I have decided to open up the sales of our physical products as well. We cannot ship hard copies right now but for that reason I have made them available to you at a huge discount. These prices are only available on our online shop (https://shop.tracks4africa.co.za/) and will only be available during the lockdown period. Please note that shipping will take place only once the South African lockdown has been lifted.

I thank you for your continued support and I trust that you and your family will remain safe during this extraordinary time.

Johann Groenewald
Tracks4Africa

*Hodophile: lover of roads or one who loves to travel. Hodophobia is an irrational fear, or phobia, of travel.

[Heatherbee]

Hi Lizette, can you tell me if there is any difference in scale between the sd card maps and the downloadable maps? What scale is used on them - I can't find this information anywhere?

Thanks

[Tommyknocker]

Tried buying the download version, their site could not accept payment.

Gave up eventually.

[petewill]

I had no problem on 1 April. Payfast worked 100%.

[DeonStr]

I bought on 17 Apr, also no problem

[jacni]

Make use of the excellent discounts on Tracks4Africa products (https://shop.tracks4africa.co.za/) during the lockdown period in South Africa. Note that delivery of the physical products such as paper maps, books and SD cards will only take place once the lockdown has ended, but that downloadable products can be purchased and downloaded now. Further information from Johann Groenewald (Groenie on the forum), owner of Tracks4Africa, below:

This message is for all hodophiles (lovers of roads). While hodophobes* may be quite content with our current constraints, I am anxiously aware of all travel restrictions while we deal with Covid-19. What to do in the downtime? Plan a road trip!

If you love the road and can't wait to get back out there, then I have good news for you. You can now buy our downloadable, Garmin compatible maps at lockdown prices. This is not a Black Friday deal to boost our numbers, this is our way of keeping all staff on board and paying salaries for the unforeseeable future.

Since we cannot ship any physical products and all our retail outlets are closed for sales, we expect quite a big delay before our cashflow will return to normal. I have made sure that we have spare cash for a rainy day, but I am afraid this is no ordinary rainy day and it might become a rainy quarter.

So I am slashing the prices of products which we can sell right now in order to give you a great deal. These are the maps you need for planning that longed-for African road trip. And in buying these maps now, you will be helping us tremendously during a very uncertain time.

Your lockdown deal
Our downloadable maps, which cover the entire African continent, usually cost R900 for a one-year subscription. You can get the year's subscription for R300 during the lockdown. If you have bought this product before, you will receive a further 50% discount, which means you can now get the GPS Africa maps for R150.

I have also introduced a five-year subscription option for the above maps, which would normally retail for R1,750. During lockdown we are discounting the five-year subscription to R875. If you want to get access to our latest maps for five years uninterrupted, then this is the most affordable way ever.

What do we mean by subscription? Our Garmin compatible maps never expire, so you can use them for as long as you have them, but the subscription entitles you to map updates during the time of your subscription. For downloadable maps we release four updates per year. You can download these from your user profile on our website and our staff is on standby to assist you if you need any help in doing so.

Plan now, travel later
I have decided to open up the sales of our physical products as well. We cannot ship hard copies right now but for that reason I have made them available to you at a huge discount. These prices are only available on our online shop (https://shop.tracks4africa.co.za/) and will only be available during the lockdown period. Please note that shipping will take place only once the South African lockdown has been lifted.

I thank you for your continued support and I trust that you and your family will remain safe during this extraordinary time.

Johann Groenewald
Tracks4Africa

*Hodophile: lover of roads or one who loves to travel. Hodophobia is an irrational fear, or phobia, of travel.

Supported.

[dickr]

Also bought on the 16th April and had no problem

[Tommyknocker]

Tx

Will try again today.

[Lizette Swart]

Hi Lizette, can you tell me if there is any difference in scale between the sd card maps and the downloadable maps? What scale is used on them - I can't find this information anywhere?

Thanks

Hallo Heather,


The downloadable maps and the SD cards are identical, but there is no scale as there are in paper maps - in paper maps the scale is fixed, on our T4A maps this is usually 1 to 1 million. But on the GPS, you can zoom in and out so the scale is always changing.


If you are working on the computer, on the bottom right hand side corner of your screen, there is a little "distance" box that will tell you how far you are zoomed in on the map. As you zoom in and out, this will change so you can always see the zoom level on the computer.

Be safe!

Lizette

[Lizette Swart]

Tx

Will try again today.

Hi Tommy,

If you don't come right, please let me know on [email protected], I will get one of our sales ladies to assist.

Regards

Lizette

[LandyLove]

I am looking at the ipad maps. Are these the same a sthe GPS maps? Can I get the same POI info? I hate the functionality of a GPS, is it better on the iPad?

[Lizette Swart]

I am looking at the ipad maps. Are these the same a sthe GPS maps? Can I get the same POI info? I hate the functionality of a GPS, is it better on the iPad?

Hi LandyLove

We have a central "warehouse" where all our data is stored. Whether we produce a GPS map, a paper map or a map for the smartphones, we pull the data from this central warehouse. So the data we use is identical, but there are differences in how it is displayed, and when the actual product (GPS or iPad map) is updated.

With regards to the updates, we release updates to the GPS maps 4 times per year. On Android and Apple, this only happens about once a year, and it is not in sync with our GPS updates - so there will be a slight difference in the data in the GPS map and Smartphone apps.

With regards to the functionality, the Overland Navigator App work different from the GPS, and many people that are used to the GPS and Google Maps complain about the functionality of the app - I myself rarely used the app until my GPS broke on a trip, and I was forced to use the app for a few days. Once I knew my way around the app, I found it much easier to use, but one has to be willing to sit and play with it to learn the ropes. If you do not enjoy the functionality of the GPS, then I am not sure if you will enjoy the functionality of the app on the smartphones.

With regards to the information being displayed, on the app you can also "drill down" to a level where you can see contact numbers, email address and website information (provided that we have this in our data - not all our POI's have this information available).

Then it is not possible to do your planning on the computer, and then send the planning to your app - there is no software available for the app and the computer to communicate. So you have to do all your planning on the app, and if you are doing a 2 or 3 week trip, this can become a bit tedious, it is much easier to plan on the computer with Basecamp than on the app. But I also know of people that used the app for a 7 month trip through Africa, and had no problems doing their planning on it - although I believe they had an overall itinerary and only planned 2 or 3 days in advance.

While it is possible to record your tracks on the app, one can only recover these tracks from the Android device and save it to the computer - so if you like to keep a record of your trips on your computer, there is no way of transferring the tracks from an Apple device to the computer, as the data is first exported to an SD card and then sent to the computer, and most (if not all?) Apple devices do not have an SD card. If you save points on the app, it is not possible to transfer waypoints from the app to the computer, both on Android and Apple.

There are some FAQ's on using the app here: https://shop.tracks4africa.co.za/faq...and-navigator/ and a document that will show you the basics of how the app works, here: https://shop.tracks4africa.co.za/wp-...and-Tricks.pdf

I hope this helps!

Regards

Lizette

[Tommyknocker]

Hi Tommy,

If you don't come right, please let me know on [email protected], I will get one of our sales ladies to assist.

Regards

Lizette

Thank you will do.

[HennieC]

Thank you will do.

Same issue experienced with Payfast payment?

Lizette, I will contact you offline

[Lizette Swart]

Same issue experienced with Payfast payment?

Lizette, I will contact you offline

Thanks Hennie,

Our support team is going to contact you now.

Regards

Lizette

Edit: We are not aware of a problem with our payment system, if you do run into problems, please email [email protected] or myself [email protected] so we can assist.

[Lizette Swart]

Hallo Everybody,

Just to let you know that the Lockdown Specials on the T4A online shop is coming to an end on Sunday 31 May 2020 - on the 1st of June we will start with a "Recovery Sale", but these prices will not be the same as the Lockdown Sale, so you have two more days to make use of these excellent prices! Shop online at: https://shop.tracks4africa.co.za/

Be safe

Regards

Lizette