Free GPS Guidance
Posts Tagged ‘GPS unit’
It is vacation time, camping time, again. Well, we wanted to find someplace new this year. We went looking for ideas of new campsites, wanted water for play and trails to wander. This is a new place, an out of the way sort of location I have never been before. Well, we packed our bags, packed the car, all piled in and started our trip by plugging in the exact address of the campground into our automotive GPS. A pretty drive and a lunch stop later we ended up in the most beautiful out of the way campground I have seen in ages. Wow, the view from our campsite is spectacular – right on the lake with mountains in the background. How much better can you get! Set up the tent, admittedly always taking longer than planned, and cooked our dinner over the outdoor fireplace. I moved the GPS unit over onto my GPS bike mount and took off on some back roads for an evening ride to discover some of our new area; that was fun. Ahhh, now it is time to rest by the fire. There will be time enough for wandering the trails with our trusty handheld GPS unit tomorrow.
Americade. You probably never heard of it, but it is the annual motorcycle rally which normally arrives in Lake George’s beautiful little resort town each year just after Memorial Day. What a sight to see cycle after cycle driving by. What a nice group of folks, mostly family types of all ages, on quite a variety of cycles. Some have three wheels, most have two. Some have side cars or little luggage trailers of amazing shapes and sizes.
While walking down the sidewalk admiring all these amazing cycles I began to notice how many had motorcycle mounts for their GPS devices. Most of the GPS units had been removed and carried off in pockets or purses to keep them safe of course, but there was quite an assortment of different motorcycle GPS mounts to be seen. It is easy to understand how folks who like the wind blowing on their faces would like the freedom of discovering new and varied roads and getting off the beaten track, but still wanting to be able to get back to their hotel or their homes reliably. Yup, it is time for the rest of the cyclists to look at the advantages of GPS units with bike mounts to feel even more carefree as they ride off into the unknown. Be safe, explore and enjoy the wind in your face on the open road.
School’s out, the kids are home. I wonder if I can use my GPS unit to get away from the kids and find myself? Well, maybe I should use it to find adventure with the kids, in so doing perhaps to help us find each other? We can grab the handheld GPS device and take off on foot exploring the trails nearby. I like to pack a picnic and head out after work and do just that. Or we could do a day trip and take off exploring in the car using the automotive GPS unit to do that. Actually, now that I think of it I probably really don’t need to leave those kids behind to find myself after all. There are some great spots here in the Adirondacks for hiking and boating or just sightseeing, even to sit beside the lake and read while the kids splash around in the water. See ya later – its a pretty day – time for me to go pack that picnic lunch and get wandering with the kids…
Oh my, we get lots of calls requesting me to make a choice for folks so that they don’t have to decide which GPS unit to buy. Looks good on paper, but how can I know which features might be really useful or totally useless to each individual person. I could just decide which GPS unit I might prefer, but how would that information help a total stranger whose needs and budget may be totally different from mine? I feel like I really disappoint people when I try to point this out, but we are all individuals, which is why there are so many different versions of, for instance, handheld or automotive GPS units out there.
Most of the manufacturers, especially Garmin, have really great interactive websites already where you can choose to compare several units to each other so that at a glance you can sort them out by which features you really want, which ones would only be nice perks and which ones are definitely yes or no features for you. Do you want it to be small and thin with a great battery life so you can carry it with you to find your way back to your car? Do you want lifetime traffic? Bluetooth? You get the idea. Anyway, once you have it narrowed down to possibly one or two favorites, it becomes simple to go back to Google or your favorite GPS store and see which one they have to offer, which types of accessories you will need and for what price they are offered. I just think it totally simplifies your shopping experience. I like simple. After all, I would rather be spending time exploring with my GPS unit than sitting in front of a computer trying to figure out all the pros and cons or entrusting my decision to someone who doesn’t even know me. Well, good luck in your search for the best GPS units for your needs and budget, and I hope this helps.
My friend and I went to a seminar away from home recently, held in a conference room at a hotel in an unfamiliar town. Well, wouldn’t you know that when we went out for lunch we took a wrong turn and got lost getting back. Who hasn’t ever done that? Anyway, we realized that the solution to our dilemma was to use her automotive GPS unit. Not having the exact address of the hotel with us, we just put in the town and the name of the hotel chain into the GPS device. This worked great! Step by step we got closer to our goal only to find that we were at another branch of that hotel chain, albeit still within the same city. I guess the moral of the story is to be as specific as possible, looking perhaps for the exit off the highway which was nearly across the street from the hotel rather than the name of the chain. Who knew that such a small city would have two? Well, lesson learned, we followed our GPS unit’s instructions back to the correct hotel just in time for our seminar to begin again. We live and learn; still, the GPS actually took us exactly where we asked it to, twice. I hope others will learn from my mistakes. Enjoy your travel with automotive GPS!
I spent years collecting dusty, outdated maps to aid my frequent cross-country business trips. For a while, these relics were a point of pride; I would only stop to ask for directions as a last resort. Those infrequent conversations with clueless clerks were as embarrassing as they were humbling. Nobody likes to admit they’re lost.
From the moment I heard about the technology, I knew automotive GPS would prove invaluable. My glove box and consoles are free of rumpled maps, and my mind is at ease now that automotive GPS systems do the navigating for me. The main perk is that I’ve cut out those tedious information sessions with gas station attendants entirely. It’s a breeze to maneuver around any city or country road, no matter how unfamiliar.