Sat Navs do we need them? (1 Viewer)

[lorger]

Hi
We have a Garmin sat nav and always have it on but not very often we have a route in it. You might wonder whats the point then well last year we did 4 weeks around Belgium,Lux,Germ,Swit and France we hadn't made any set plans just a rough idea of the direction we where heading and if you keep your sat on as someone else said you always know where you are and its handy for things like if you need a garage,resturant or campsite as it will list them all within a certain distance. Last year we had a faulty connection on our battery terminal and didn't have a spanner to fit so just typed in Peugeot garage and it took us to one within 5 miles would i have found it myself maybe after a few wrong turns or just by luck.
So in my opinion sat navs are not just about getting you from A - B they are much more than that we also carry maps with us as i like sitting at night sometimes working out roughly which way i will head.
Gerry

 

[JJ]

There you are moving gently along, cruise control on, sun shining down, your favourite tracks playing on the sound system, diesel in your tank, freshwater tank full, waste water and cassette empty, time on your hands and then you feel a bit peckish... just stretch forward a touch and touch POI on the sat nav screen... touch "restaurants" and then Jane will take you to the nearest Burger King for a Double Whopper (with extra cheese and bacon, no pickle)

I love motorhoming and with my Tom Tom I love it even more.

And please, please, pleeeeeeese note, you can always switch it off and rely on the map and instincts if you want, for whatever reason, to re-live the old days....

 

[Wildman]

Of course you don't need one, we always used to manage with a map, mind you I do have less argument with Ron Wright, even though he sometime wrong and sometimes right, hee hee

^{_{Subscribers  do not see these advertisements}}

 

[gazznsam]

i wouldent be without a sat nav, but i prefer tomtom to garmin... tho i only have a nuvi 250 by garmin, i just dont like the garmin interface, and the way if you need to detour, you get a single 'detour' button, and all the times i've used it, it takes me in a big circle and practicaly back to where i was when i asked it for a detour..... it's hell if a roads cloased as it just tried to take you onto that same road a little further up.

at least tomtom you can tell it the roads blocked ahead, or to avoid this or that,

just tomtom keeps lying to me, 'bear left' it say, but there never is

for me, i wouldent have seen half of europe with a paper map, we get all the poi's of the aires and stellplatz's, and i just look on the overview map and select an aire in a place i think would be nice, and just get it to take me there,

it takes us down some lovely routes, ok half these routes you wouldent really want to take anything wider than a motorbike down, but it'll get you there with the passenger free to take photo's as we drive along, instead of having to study a paper map all the time.

it's also handy in germany when i like to run on biodiesel, when i'm getting low i just ask the sat nav to take me to the nearest petrol station selling bio, and i'm there,
same with when i wanted to get on the internet, i had a set of open wifi hotspot poi's, these can be fast food places, hotels, or peoples private networks that they had opened up for people to use and say so in the network name,

We also like geocaching occasionaly, this is a modern day treasure hunt so to speak, where you use the gps to track down a 'cache' which you sign a log to say you have found it, and swap little trinkets, and move on travel bugs... these are items that you take from the cache you find it in to the next one you find and drop off, then the next person does it, i have 4 travel bugs out in caches.. one for each of my ratties, 2 of them havent moved far, but nuggets and tatyana's have gone over 200 miles, but they have only been out a few months, some do 20 odd thousand miles all over the world.

 

[American Dream]

Well I must say I have been well imprssed with the level of support I have received from Tom Tom.

Had major issues when a latest map download caused some problems.

I asked the questions re formatting the unit completely and rebuilding the operating system and maps etc from scratch and now it's working very well indeed.

I wouldn't hesitate to go back to them for another.:thumb::Cool:

Yes there may still be some scantily mapped areas but I just download/upload the amendments to them and it just gets better and better.:thumb:

Being able to drive without the passenger reading a map all the time is so much more enjoyable.

 

[scotjimland]

Being able to drive without the passenger reading a map all the time is so much more enjoyable.

Speaking from personal experience, it must have had some impact on the divorce rate.. for that alone it's worth while .. :hug:

Woman and maps don't go together .. oh: hardhat

^{_{Subscribers  do not see these advertisements}}