Summer Adventure - Week #1

I fly as number two on the U. S Army Skysoldiers Demonstration Team. My 296 unit software, air Navdata and obstacle database are updated before a mission. In conjuction with current publications, the Garmin enhances a good plan and announces when you are a specified distance from controlled airspace. We are able to go through all airspace types and cross country in low weather with every obstacle announced. The Army Aviation Heritage Foundation is planning to install a 430 unit in each aircraft on the team. Here, I am updating our route on my 296 which is mounted in front of the weapons sight, while flight leader DeHart calls into HQ to let them know we are holding for a short time due to the heavy smoke and fog in South Georgia. My unit has travelled the country in airplanes and helicpoters and vehicles the last few summers. We have been from Hampton Georgia, to Louisvile and Punta Gorda and Fort Launderdale this spring alone.

Summer Adventure - Week #2

I just returned from a 2,460 mi motorcycle tour of the eastern US from Indianapolis, IN to Orlando, FL. During the 6 days, I rode through IN, KY, TN, VA, NC, SC, FL and GA. All along the way, my Garmin zumo 450 was my constant companion and helped me find where I was going, where to eat, how long until I got where I was going and where to stop for fuel. Though at times Veronica (I nicknamed the woman's voice which provides narration for the directions...) were at odds with me wanting to go one direction and her wanting me to go another, my Garmin GPS was a valuable addition to my touring gear. I'll never do another long trip without it. Attached is a photo of the bike and Veronica at the top of Clingman's Dome in TN which at 6,643ft. is the tallest point in TN. Also, detailed reports of my excursion are posted at http://www.roudybob.net/?cat=15.

Summer Adventure - Week #3

Hi there! Well we just got back from an epic 10 day 1,800 mile road trip through the Southwest. We flew to Salt Lake City, where we hired a car, and drove to Albuquerque, via Bryce Canyon, Zion Canyon, Grand Canyon, Monument Valley, Mesa Verde, San Juan Highway, and Santa Fe. What a trip! We’re from New Zealand, but live in New York, so our Nuvi 360 was a must for our trip. We planned the whole thing out on Mapsource before we went, which helped us structure each leg. The fact that we could just land in Salt Lake City, plug in the Nuvi, and head off was amazing! That we could ‘see’ the road ahead while driving was great too, with some seriously winding roads though the mountains. I run with a Forerunner 305, so took that along too, to record our day hikes, and mark our campsites. The photo is from our first day hike around the hoodoos in Bryce Canyon. You guys sure do have a beautiful country!!!

Summer Adventure - Week #4

Taking a Garmin on an expedition to collect marine sponges for the University of CA Santa Cruz. We use our GPS device to pinpoint the coordinates of the collection. That way when chemicals extracted from the sponge show anticancer activity we know exactly where to go back to get more. Our GPS is really old, please pick me to win a new one! http://chemistry.ucsc.edu/mnpr/

Summer Adventure - Week #5

My family and I enjoyed a wonderful trip to Europe. Our first week was spent in Scotland and England. Far too much precious time was spent lost or in the round-abouts!!!! They don't believe in addresses or street signs over there!! So when we arrived in Ireland and went to get our next rental car it was a NO BRAINER to also rent a Garmin GPS System. So easy to use. It was really peace of mind for us and a whole lot less arguing on which way to turn or what motorway to get on! The lady that speaks on it speaks with an Irish accent so we spoke back to her with an Irish accent too. It made our trip SOOOOOOOO much more enjoyable. Next time you travel and need to rent a car, if they offer a rental Garmin GPS System, get it!! It's worth every penny!!! Gonna' get a Garmin!!!

Summer Adventure - Week #6

I regularly use my Garmin 60CSx geocaching. This one particular geocache is in Tucson, AZ where I am doing an internship for the summer. I used Geeps ( what I named my GPS) to get me near the geocache and it was in an area with quite a few cacti. Since I was new in the area, I didn't realize there were so many different types. Well, I proceeded to the cache following Geeps' lead. I had a good idea of where it might be and proceeded cautiously, but I wasn't cautious enough. I took a step and I had been poked by a cholla (type of cactus in the picture). Wirthing in pain, I pulled it out and took another step only to get stung again by the same cholla. As I danced around in pain trying to pull out the needle, Geeps beeped at me telling me I was within 30 feet. Well, I could see where the geocache was hidden and it was protected by well...more cholla. I was reluctant to go in for it but thought, "I've been through all this pain for this cache. I can't leave now." so I continued on being as careful as I could. I found the cache, signed the logbook, and headed off thinking I was free from the cholla only to get stung again in my ankle! What luck! I eventually made it out and Geeps took me to my next cache. If only Garmin could integrate some tool to my GPS to help keep away cholla...

Summer Adventure - Week #7

Dearest Garmin, I'm writing to let you know how you saved our vacation, sanity, marriage, etc. We recently went on a 6 state, 5 day vacation to see New England. We relied on Garmin to guide us from state to state...and it did...perfectly. One night in Vermont after a long search for moose, down winding empty roads - we got hungry. We asked our little Garmin where the nearest place to eat was and it directed us down a gravel road to a litte farm house that we would've never found otherwise. When we got out we saw people waiting for a seat in the back around campfires. Our Garmin had delivered us to the greatest organic pizza place in the country: American Flatbread. All organic pizza baked by a wood fire in a clay hearth. How, oh great makers of Garmin, how can we thank you? We thought it would only be proper to express our love for Garmin in a video - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4DGUY9AMi2E We hope it brings you much business. Now...if only you had a GPS system that could find moose. (wink) All the best, R. and R. Miskowski

Summer Adventure - Week #8

On July 2 & 3 we did a class about using GPS in education. The location was Belleville, Illinois at the Regional Office of Education. Teachers learned what GPS is all about, we did a multi virtual geocaching activity and for recess, we took them out and did the Geko Smack. Some teachers called it administrator smack, for some reason they had the highest scores. We did two sessions of 30 teachers, they all had 6 hours of instruction about GPS and they all got a Garmin GPS 60 unit to keep. Yes we did have 60 teachers right before July 4th participate in this training event.

Summer Adventure - Week #9

My friend, Willy, and I are riding our mountain bikes (and towing two loaded down BOB trailers) from Mexico to Banff, Canada following the Great Divide Mountain Bike Route put together by the Adventure Cycling Association. We keep all of our friends and family updated on our progress at www.rideabout.com.

We use Garmin products everyday:
- I have a 60CSx mounted on my handlebars with the waypoints and MapSource maps for the route loaded up and helping ensure we don't miss a turn.
- I have a Forerunner 305 recording my tracks and heart rate data.
- Willy has an Edge 305 on his bike where he constantly watches the elevation gain and loss for the day and wonders when the next big uphill is coming.

We upload the GPS data to Garmin TC each night on the 12" PowerBook we carry with us and when we get access to WiFi we upload the data to MotionBased (cclark.motionbased.com).

GPS data and Garmin gadgets are a part of our daily routine as we spend about two months in the saddle this summer seeing a side of America which too few people have the chance to experience. Unlike the other winners we have to pedal our "vehicles" the 2,700 miles from start to finish but it seems we encounter something new and exciting with every pedal stroke!

Summer Adventure - Week #10

Two friends and I took a vacation down to Mexico for the latter half of July. We headed down to Bahia de Los Angeles for snorkeling on all of the small islands in the Bay and to see the ancient cave paintings in the middle of the peninsula near Mission San Borja. Since we were doing a lot exploring, I brought along my GpsMap 76csx. I bought it originally for recording in 3D all of my hang gliding flights, but now I find myself taking it with me any time I leave the house.

Thanks to the 76, I was able to record everywhere we went on the boat, marked a ton of waypoints for when we go back next year, and we then downloaded everything to Google Earth to relive the trip! We now know which islands we need to hit up for our next trip, and which ones we have yet to explore.

Attached is a picture of me and my friends on Ventana island in the Bahia! Because I marked it on the 76, we can easily return and take a better picture next year!

My 76csx has been awesome for recording all the off road places I've been to and all of the inflight adventures I've had! Thanks for such a great product!

Summer Adventure - Week #11

July 7, 2007 (07/07/07) was a hot and busy day in fabulous Las Vegas, Nevada. Everyone was trying their luck on the triple 7 date. Kevin and I aren’t much on gambling, so we decided to get married instead. When we planned our rendezvous, we opted to rent a car equipped with a Garmin. We'll never regret that decision! We navigated throughout downtown Vegas, The Strip, and over to Hoover Dam without the aggravation of a basic map, or getting lost, and this was our very first trip to Sin City! Most importantly, we made it to the chapel on time. We'll never regret that decision either! We fell in love with Garmin, so much so that Garmin is Slide No.2 on our honeymoon slideshow. I’m not kidding. Sadly, Kevin and I had to leave Garmin behind when our trip came to an end. Since being home in South Carolina, we realize that we need Garmin on our local roads as well. As sappy as it sounds, we will always think fondly of Garmin. After all, we discovered it during one of the happiest times of our lives, and it made our happy time even happier when it took the stress away from navigating. We really got LUCKY in Vegas!

Summer Adventure - Week #12

I just had to share my story with other likeminded people - my wife and I celebrated 25 years of marriage this year and decided to celebrate with a vacation that was different - a 3 week, 3500 mile and 14 country motorcycle tour of Europe. We started in N Ireland and 3 weeks later got back there having visited Amsterdam, Dortmund, Prague, Vienna, Zurich, Paris and motorcycled across the highest alpine peak in Austria - Grossglockner. All the time our constant companion "Jill", as our Zumo 550 affectionately became known guided us flwalessly through one sweeping bend after another and as we didnt book hotel accomodation in advance Jill helped us locate hotels effortlessly at the end of each day. Even on those rare occasions when I ignored the fuel light being on Jill found us the lifesaving gas station just in time.

I dont know how anyone could contemplate a motorcycle trip without GPS and with the Zumo connecting via Bluetooth to our helmet Intercom system we were kept informed every turn we needed to take - this was a trip of a lifetime and helped ensure that the second 25 years of marriage got off to a good start with no stress, arguments or fall outs over wrong turns or no room to sleep - thanks Garmin for a wonderful product. BTW - the ability to load the route we took back into Mapsource and Google Earth means to can relive the experience anytime we feel the need.

Summer Adventure - Week #13

Not a major thriller... just your basic "gotta get away, thank heaven for my Garmin" story. We took a vacation for our 20th anniversary. Went to Maui. Now I have taken my StreetPilot on business trips and a few vacations, but never quite the long trip to the middle of the Pacific. I was very pleased, having never checked before, to find that the Hawaiian Islands were fully covered in my North American maps. So I plotted out a few locations; hotels, beaches, restaurants... even the house of an old (lucky he's living there) friend, and we flew 10 hours from New York to Maui. No problems whatsoever as we left the airport and headed to the resort. Using the Garmin was as easy as expected, just chnaged the time zone and off we went! What was really cool though, was that we decided to travel the Hana Highway, the most scenic and twisting roadway along the north coast of Maui. My wife doesn't thrill over narrow and unknown pathways, but keeping an eye on the map (and having plotted out a few waypoints along the way), we were able to meander out and back without trouble. Even marked a few spots we wanted to return to but ran out of time. But the best part was being able to get in the car and "just drive" without one of us haivng our head down in a map all the time, missing the beauty of our surroundings. So now I've saved all the waypoints and a few routes, even printed out the maps where we were and went... and where we'll be sure to return *next time* we go back.