It's December 2023, and I am cycling with my surfboard along the Baja Divide. I get to a crossroads and I think: "Do I continue following the Baja Divide, not knowing what to expect, or do I go along the Panamericana?" Loving off-road cycling, I keep following the Baja Divide and end up on one of the worst "roads" I've ever cycled along. I did 37km in 8h. I wish I knew it was that bad.
Pushing my 50kg bike along the Baja Divide
That got me thinking: "Why is it so hard to find information about routes? How is it possible that we don't have an app where to share it?" and that's how the idea of developing a "bikepacking superapp" came to my head.
Once I finished the Baja Divide, I started working on it. It was March 2024. I am a civil engineer and have no background in coding or UI/UX, but I was very determined. I laid out the idea of the app on paper and shared it on UpWork, and ended up hiring Vipul, an amazing developer based in India. On our first meeting, I realised that before coding an app, it is very important to have a UI/UX prototype (yes, that's how ignorant I was), so I stopped everything and went to find a Figma expert to transform what I had in my head into a clickable prototype. Once we had that, Vipul started coding, and by September 2024, Rolling Around was live on the App and Play Store with the simplest version of the app possible.
The main problems I wanted to solve were the following:
1 – Stop having to jump from one app to another to find information.
2 – Being unsure if the GPX file I was using was correct/up-to-date.
3 – Being unsure if the waypoints on that route were correct/up-to-date.
4 – Not being able to automatically share with others the waypoints I added to a map.
5 – Stop having people asking the same questions on FB and WhatsApp groups over and over.
6 – Find a better way to share route-related updates than having to ask/write on social media.
How did we solve those problems?
I uploaded tens of ready-to-navigate routes on Rolling Around. If you add a waypoint to one of them, anyone else using the app can see it, comment on it, vote on its accuracy and share it. Think of it as the cloud version of a GPX file. If the GPX file needs an update, the route's creator can immediately update it on our Route Manager, and anyone using the app will see the changes straight away. You do not need to check if you have the latest version, and you don't have to download the route and send it to your bike computer after each update. You can use Rolling Around to see where you are on the map, and we also built a feature called Live Updates to share the latest information about the route directly on the its page.
Other features we implemented:
By observing WhatsApp groups, I realised people were constantly asking the same questions about accommodation, bike shops, visa requirements, airline policies…. To make things simpler, we built a waypoint map (think of iOverlander but for bikepacking) and two FAQ sections, one for "how to fly with a bike" and the other about visa requirements. We also wanted cyclists to connect, so we also built a feature to find people to cycle together, and another one just to hang out while taking a break somewhere. There is also a marketplace for buying and selling bikepacking-related gear and bikes, and a feature to share Lost & Found items.
I didn't realise how hard it is to build an app, but it was and still is amazing to see people using it. We now have almost 2000 users and, thanks to you, more than 4000 waypoints on our map.
Now let's get into the questions I get asked most of the time.
Why did you build it?
For what I mentioned above, plus I was bored at work and wanted to build something useful for people.
The app is free – where did/do you find the money?
Savings
If the app is free, why is it not open source?
This is the question I always struggle with the most, as I am non-technical, but from my understanding, open-source projects are slow to grow and seldom succeed. I wanted Rolling Around to grow "quickly", and I wanted to be able to steer it in the direction I thought best.
How can I ensure that after adding a lot of information to it, you won't charge us to use the waypoints map?
I pledge to never, ever monetise what is user-driven. Everything you see in the app today will always be free for everyone.
Ok, fine, we trust you, but as the app grows, you will eventually need money, or are you a rich kid?
I am not. During almost 1.5 years working on it, I focused on all the useful features that did not require much cash to be built and maintained, but I ran out of ideas. If we want to keep the app as it is, I do not need extra money, but although Rolling Around is good, it is far away from being the "bikepacking superapp" I had in mind. This is because it lacks offline functionality and the option to import/export GPX files, among other things.
Ok, what's next?
50% of the time I bikepack, I have no signal and for the other 50% signal is pretty bad, so being able to use the app offline is key. The thing is, implementing that features costs a lot of money, and I can't afford it, so I either have to find sponsors or investments. In both cases, it will be a premium feature.
What I am trying to ask you all is: am I building what you need/want?
I built Rolling Around following the Lean Startup approach. I created the minimum viable product I had in mind, got it out there, gathered feedback and built on it. Over and over. Everything you see in the app is something the community asked me to build.
Yes, we have many great apps out there, but none of them were built from the ground app with bikepacking (and bikepacking only) at their core.
However, I came to realise that although people told me they wanted it, not many are using it. So, what do you think of it? Should I continue developing it? Should I find investments, sponsors, and build an offline functionality, an option to import and export GPX files and many other premium features to bring Rolling Around to the next level and make it the app of choice for bikepacking? Or should I just leave it as it is, basically an iOverlander for bikepacking, and never look at it again?
In case you never saw the app, below are screenshots of the features I mentioned above.
More info on www.rollingaround.app
As a last note, please be kind with your answers. Reddit is an easy place to unleash hate while safely hiding behind a screen. Don't do it. Nobody deserves it.
by DEng1neer
1 Comment
I’m not an experienced bike packer. My first trip is coming up in a month and it’s only a three day UK Coast to Coast ride.
I’m obsessed with maps though so when I’m planning any ride I’ll be using a mixture of Komoot, Google Earth, Streetview, and bing maps for the OS maps feature. For that I’ll have my maps on large monitors so I can see a lot and flick quickly between them. I find planning on an app difficult because of the screen size.
I use Komoot a lot for the social recommendations and particularly the photos of roads and paths so I can get an idea of whether I can get my bike of choice along that route, especially if it’s in an area when I can’t get streetview. I’ll often route my gravel bike down bridleways but it’s useful to have a photo that shows hazardous sections so I can get n idea of whether to bother trying that way or not. The other thing I like about Komoot to is the other routes that are posted in that I can either export to my computer or edit and then export. The coast to coast route that I’m doing I’ve been able to edit into my own sections that start and stop and the places where we’re staying overnight. When I’ve looked at your map it appears that I can work out some of the routes by following the campsite but they’re not in as obvious lines.
That being said, the most frustrating thing I’ve found about planning this trip is the lack of information about places to stay en route. I do like the idea of being able to view a route that I’m doing and see where all the campsites, bothies, and potentially bike friendly B&Bs are.