I have a story about how my wife and I just might have had our lives saved by our Garmin® GPS. Wednesday of last week my wife and I were salmon fishing on Lake Huron in the Upper Peninsula. We have a cottage in the Cedarville, Michigan, area and we love to salmon fish out in the "big" water. Our Garmin GPS 12 gets us to our fishing hot spots day after day and year after year flawlessly. The Garmin GPS 12 is also how I get to my tree stand in the dark during deer season.

We were fishing about 2.5 miles from what is referred to as the yacht entrance. I have the last channel marker saved in my GPS as the best reference to the yacht entrance. If I get to that can, I am able to find my way into safe harbor with my eyes closed. During this evening, I was setting up our downriggers for another run when I noticed lightening on the horizon. I mentioned this to my wife and we decided to pull up and head in.

The weather report said only a 30 percent chance of scattered thunderstorms. Where we were turned into a 100 percent chance and the worst thunderstorm I have ever seen. In just the short time it took to break down the trolling rods and get the gear ready, the storm reached us. I did not realize how close it was as my attention was to the stern stowing gear. My wife was telling me to hurry as she faced what was about to hit us. As I turned to take over the wheel, I saw as nasty a sky as ever I have seen in my life. I could actually see black streaks of clouds move down to the water. The rain and wind swirling looked like a wall of water. This turbulence was just ahead of us and it was impossible to see into it at all. My wife donned her life vest and helped me put on my raincoat. She was attempting to help me put my vest on while I kept one hand on the wheel.

Then we were hit with nature's fury like I have never witnessed before, much less felt from a 22-foot boat. The canvas top was down, so we felt the wind and water hitting us so hard I could not keep my eyes open. The wind and water swirling made so much noise my wife and I had to scream at each other to be heard. If I kept my head tucked under the windshield, I could just for a split second make out the compass, but in the violent pitching of the boat, I really did not know what direction we were heading. The boat kept running and I did my best to keep the bow facing the waves. Waves were coming from all directions in the swirling wind, and my wife and I were just holding on to keep from being swept overboard. After some time, there seemed to be a general direction to the wind, so I knew which direction to face the boat. The rain was so hard I cannot describe it. So this is how we coped for some time, ducking close to the windshield to look at our depth and compass direction.
I knew that not far from where we hit the storm is a group of islands where you can encounter huge rocks quite a distance from shore. The depth gauge said that we were getting close even though I could see no further than the end of the boat. We were in serious trouble and I had no idea which way to steer out of it. The GPS was off at the time because we did not need it before the storm.

I was relieved to find the little handheld unit had not blown off the dashboard. I turned it on and kept a tight grip on it and the wheel and would go back and forth, sticking my head under the windshield to see if the unit would lock on in this madness. In the middle this terrible storm, it took only a few minutes to come to life.

I did a "GoTo" to CAN1, our salvation point. It showed me that we were indeed very close to the dangerous rocks. While the wind and rain howled, we prayed as I did what I could to get the boat away from the rocks and headed to CAN1. It seemed like an eternity, but the wind and rain actually started to slow down. Sure enough, CAN1 got closer and the storm passed over us. We both took a bit of time to just stay put as we thanked God for helping us get through this. I thought later that day that I would send along a note of thanks. I knew then as I see now that I would not be able to express our gratitude as you fine people deserve. Thanks to you, our Garmin GPS 12 was our lifesaver.

C. & L. B.

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