OUTDOOR COMPASS
Start by the river and keep going up to the ridgelines. Taipei's riverside bikeways, the Grand Trail and its classic climbs: RivAscend finds the stretch that fits the time you have, what you feel like and who you're with, keeps the way you went, and plays the whole day back to you.
WALK · RIDE · EXPLORE
THE IDEA
A compass doesn't decide where you go; it tells you where you stand. RivAscend starts on the riverside Taipei knows best and, on the same map, takes you up the trails and the mountain roads.
417 km of riverside bikeways from Taipei and New Taipei to Daxi in Taoyuan. Ride, run or walk; loops go out on one bank and back on the other, never back the way you came.
Sections 1 to 7 of the Taipei Grand Trail, from their official starts, ends and waypoints, with distance, climb and suggested time; finish one and carry on with the next.
Classic bike climbs, Fengguizui, Maokong, Xiaoyoukeng, Lengshuikeng, Beiyi and Guanyinshan, on one map, with gradients and climb from the national terrain data.
WHAT IT DOES
Say how long you have, whether you want to unwind or train, who's coming and whether it's your own bike or a YouBike, and it lines up routes from the entrances near you. Its ranking model v1 was compared with the rules before it went live.
Five ways out in one app, each measured its own way: speed for a ride, pace for a run, an automatic pause when you stop. No route needed to start recording.
It keeps counting distance and pace with the phone locked in your pocket; mark places along the way, take photos, write a line, and come home to your own journal.
A morning by the river, a trail at noon, a climb in the afternoon: tick the outings of one day and play them as one on the map, the photos appearing in order; on iPhone, make it a 9:16 video to share.
Greater Taipei's rivers drawn as one map, a stamp for each stretch you've been along; bronze, silver and gold medals for stamps, each river and the six classic climbs (with your best time).
The map and the ranking model are built in, so it plans under a bridge with no signal. Your location is worked out on the phone, and the share picture hides the first and last 200 m. Free, no account.
OPEN DATA
Check conditions on site. Routes are made from OpenStreetMap and government open data (riverside parks, floodgates, YouBike stations, terrain and weather), and the app shows the data's date; for works, closures and floodgates, go by what's on site and the official notices.
Data sources and licences: data-en.html. RivAscend is not an official service of Taipei City, YouBike or any other brand.