In this chapter we will familiarize ourselves with mobile navigation and route planning through OSMAnd using Open Street Maps (OSM) as a base map. OSM maps are geo-referenced - each feature (village, peak, trail...) shown on the map is geo-coded which means it's exact location on the ground (planet) is known. Therefore our current location on the ground (determined by the phone GPS) can be displayed directly on the map (blue arrow) to see our relative position with respect to other features shown on the map.

You can zoom in / out on the map - the scale of the current view is shown at the bottom indicating the actual distance on the group. You can zoom out (scale 2km, 5km) to get an overall view of the entire route / surrounding region. While navigating it's recommended to keep the scale at max. 100-200m so you can track your progress / movement on the map and quickly identify in case you are wandering off from the planned route.

As we hike along a trail through the mountains our position (blue arrow) will move along the trail shown on the map. If the arrow moves away from the trail it means we are going wrong (as shown in below image) and have to get back onto the trail. The arrow shows our direction of movement allowing us to easily identify whether we are moving in the right direction towards our target destination.