desnivel

21:52 Feb 16, 2010 

numbers"? Did you know that if you measure a footpath on a map with a piece of string, the resulting distance may be a lot less than the actual distance you walk? If your route lies across barrancos you will be walking either downhill or uphill virtually all the time and you will walk many more (kilo)metres than the route measured with a piece of string on the map.

Perhaps it would be helpful for you to post an example of this kind of "desnivel" so that peers can judge which suggested answer(s) fit(s) the context, i.e. which one(s) to agree with.

My preliminary impression is that "altitude change" and "height difference" are the only ones you could use with "numbers" because they are only ones that are quantifiable in (kilo)metres.

21:50 Feb 16, 2010 

It's about the difference in altitude between point a and point b. How that difference is breached is something else. Sorry it takes so many words!

16:14 Feb 16, 2010 

Good for your, Simon! Have one on me! Now I'll get on with my own text!

16:11 Feb 16, 2010 

I already stated in my own answer that I considered there could be more than one answer.

On the other hand, I don't work as a surveyor and have never worked in this field, but I have done several translations in this field and, so far, I've had no correction made. In any case, here we're discussing Simon's text which is not about surveying.

16:09 Feb 16, 2010 

Thanks to all - I'm going to mull it over (in the bar!)

16:06 Feb 16, 2010 

http://www.raidecp.net/raid/evenement/iti.php

Margaret, it's fine to disagree! You know that a lot of the time there is more than one right answer. I spend a lot of my time running and for mountain races this is the terminology used to describe positive + negative height differences.

PS: Regarding the surveying, I am a land surveyor with 20 years experience as a product manager with a survey instrument manufacturer. I can assure you that all 3 of the big survey manufacturers use height difference in their products. Altitude is used in a specific context in surveying but that's opening up a completely new discussion!

16:01 Feb 16, 2010 

I would even prefer "altitude" if it were a a land survey.

16:00 Feb 16, 2010 

Sorry, Kevin, I don't really agree with you, considering this is about a walk/trek.

15:59 Feb 16, 2010 

Simon, as I said in a surveying context the translation is height difference or elevation difference and i think it fits here.

If you have a small box in which to place the text, a common abbreviation of height difference is ΔH (m).

Accumulated height difference is used for summing all up and downhill height differences

15:58 Feb 16, 2010 

"accumulated / total difference in altitude"

15:53 Feb 16, 2010 

And the next sentence referring to the whole 5 day hike!

Desnivell positiu acumulat: 3715 metros

(in Catalan but I asked in Spanish to get more answerers!!=

15:47 Feb 16, 2010 

Definitely, "difference in altitude" here.

15:46 Feb 16, 2010 

The word occurs in little stats boxes about the walk/trek

and the idea is the following:

the walk starts at 1,500 m above sea level and the peak is at 3,000 m, so th 'desnivel' is . . . ?