Walkie talkie for coordinating across groups?
 

Our team is going to be taking a bike trip into the mountains, but different groups will be doing different routes and will be going at different speeds. We'd like to be able to communicate with each other and we probably will not be able to rely on cell phones. Can anyone recommend a walkie talkie set that they know has a radius of at least a few miles in the mountains? I saw a walkie talkie that claimed 50 miles ideal but reviews said 1-2 miles in the non-ideal.

The FRS walkie-talkie radios have an ideal range of about 40 miles, on the clear / flat / open, but about a mile when obstructed.

They are handy w/ multiple channels and call alert options.

While it is more hoops to jump, I would recomend getting an Amature Radio license. It will give you a lot more flexibility in small radios.

My friends and I went to a big anti war protest march,
to keep from bring lost in the crowd,
he brought some marine band walky talkies, off his sailboat..

Portland.. on the confluence of 2 rivers ..




...

No radio will give you miles of range unless you are using a repeater, are on a mountain top or on flat, unobstructed terrain. With that said, MURS will be your best bet for range in mountains, but the radios will be bigger and heavier than FRS/GMRS bubble pack ones.

Honestly, I would go with some small FRS/GMRS ones that run on AA batteries. While you may not always be able to contact the other group or groups, it is a good compromise between size, weight and usefulness. Yes, everyone should have a GMRS license to use the GMRS channels but if you stick to the FRS only ones no license is required. And while I don't promote it, I doubt you'd get in trouble for using the higher power GMRS ones without a license.

I'm not here to start the license/no license argument, just to give my thoughts on radios (and yes, I do have a GMRS license).