[Paddlewise] GPS report

About 7 months ago I asked for help in picking out a GPS for my wife for
her Christmas present.  And I promised a number of people that I would
report on the results of my search.  Here goes, after using it for a
while I am ready to give you all my take.  All in all it is a great
toy.  And I am using it far more than my better half.  She does like the
ability to see where she paddled, how far and average moving speed.
Just wants me to do the work, which is fine with me  :-)

I got a Garmin E-Trex Legend, with their Roads and Recreation CD.  The
CD it self is $80 US  :-(
but the GPS wouldn't be as much fun without it.  Garmin has a number of
CDs including a Waterways and Lights CD that has a little more
navigation detail but not as much road/land detail.  I found this out
later when a paddling partner loaned me his copy of the Nav and Lights
CD to play with.

I can download the track I make from the GPS to the computer with the
software that came on the CD and a serial cable that Garmin sells.  The
CD also has the map database.

When I have the track displayed on screen I can use the screen capture
ability of my image management software (I use CompuPic) and save the
screen as a jpg file.  Then, I crop out all the extraneous stuff at the
top and bottom of the Garmin screen (menu bars, etc.) and save the
cropped image and send it to the people who were on the trip.  That
e-mail is well received by those on the trip.  One problem is that it
has to "see" the satellites (almost literally), so you can't stick it
too deep in your pocket or pack, but it will work, say, on a car
dashboard or boat deck.

The Legend is one model down from the top model in Garmin's E-Trex line,
(their portable line).  If I had to do it over I would spend the money
to get the top line model with more memory.

What ever model you get make sure that it displays map's!  It's way more
fun to see where you are, as opposed to just lat. and long.  The GPS
comes with a basic map of the US but it only includes major roads, not
secondary streets.  The more memory allows you to download more local
maps  from the data base to the GPS, save longer tracks, and the
resultant detail is greater.  Maps, as far as the US version, are in
county chunks.  Memory is important, on a trip (by car) from Washington
DC to Cape Cod, the Legend ran out of memory for the track and over
wrote the beginning of the trip.  It also eats batteries (two AA's).
However, getting the power cable for your car's cigarette lighter is a
great help.

On my last trip, a 12 miler, the track had a break in it.  This happened
when the GPS got turned upside down when I hit it with my hand and
didn't notice.  The GPS lost satellite reception and turned itself off.

Hope this helps, I picked mine up online at a URL called tvnav.com.
They had the best price by far after a extensive web search.  Service
was prompt.  As usual, I have no commercial interest in the products or
merchants mentioned here.  Just a satisified customer.

One more thing, the electronics on the Legend are waterproof, but the
battery compartment is not!  A dry bag (I use a Voyageur model made for
cell phones) is necessary.  The Voyageur is the second one I purchased.
The first one was too stiff and I could not manuplate the controls.

John Blackburn


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