Magellan eXplorist 610 GPS

I'm back on Vancouver Island hunting. It was only 2 years ago that I rolled my quad and was trapped under it for a while. I thought at the time, this isn't good. I was surrounded by elk quarters, had a little dog barking at an unknown beast in the woods, probably a cougar and  my rifle was broken.  When I got back through the miracle of prayer and the arrival of a human angel, I decided that I needed to carry a satellite phone with me when I was hunting in the wilderness.
Last week Tom and I were in the truck when a tree blocked our path and it was doubtful whether we'd be able to get up the slippery slope we'd just slid down.  I had the Iridium Satellite Phone but I didn't know where we were. It was looking like we'd need a tow truck.  I have a couple of gps on my sailboat.  Both are really slow.  Neither takes the backroads maps.
The Magellan eXplorist 610 GPS is awesome. I was in Nanaimo at the Canadian Tire and looked at all the garmin and magellan backwoods hand held gps.  This was the one that was easiest to use.  We found Nanaimo, right off.  One of the other gps seemed stuck in Kansas.  This one comes loaded with a world map and a special map of Canada with the logging trails of British Columbia in detail. I love it.  
I am over here because it's the last place to hunt without having to drive around in slippery snow.  Since my quad was stolen,  I've been driving about in my truck again experiencing the sheer terror of sliding in mud and snow. I have the chains but always remember skiing down a mountain with chains on and still no traction.  I have the Honda 250 in the back and that was awesome early in the season before the rains and snow. Now it's my escape pod. I figure if I get stuck or the truck breaks down I can unload the motorcycle and Gilbert and I can get away from a zombie attack.
In the meantime I'm driving around on Vancouver Island logging trails getting thoroughly lost only to look at the gps and see which river and lake I'm by and which logging main is nearby.  I love it.
I sailed with a sextant and now I love my gps.  I love the gps in my Miata sportscar too but this one is the best.  It's the most intuitive of them all with great visuals.  I love the screen sensitivity. I'm spoiled by Apple's technology. I don't like the old fashioned ways inputting of data. We're spoiled so soon.  This Magellan rocks.  Next I'll be wanting a cyborg brain meld telepathic heads up link and wonder how I ever got by with just touch screen.
I just tap this Magellan exploits 610 and screens appear. I push my finger across the screen and the map moves. What could be easier.  I like that it takes two double AA batteries too. I like rechargeable but when it comes to wilderness I like to have the option of batteries. I have both rechargeable VHS radios on my off shore sailboat and a couple with batteries just in case.  If I want to use 'rechargeable batteries" I can. What I liked to is the Magellan came with batteries and the USB cable to attach to the computer. I didn't need to attach it to the computer to use it right off either. It was fully functional out of the box in the store while other gps required computer interface before they could be used or one had to buy the wilderness map extra.  Not this one.  I love technology that's was made by someone who considered I just might be an idiot.  The young kid in the Canadian Tire store was fantastic, way faster than me with his thumbs but I didn't have to be a 20 year old, or worse, a teen ager, to have this Magellan working right out of the box.  I love that.
I've hooked up to magellangps.com too where there's lots of support. When I'm travelling around the world I can get other maps specific to the region I'm visiting from Navionics while the world map already loaded is good enough.
And I love the camera.  I carry my iPhone with me and usually take pictures with that. Increasingly I'm getting iPhone coverage too for moments on the tops of mountains.  Now I can take pictures with the gps.  They're almost as good as the iPhone .  The problem with the iphone maps was that I had to have coverage. This meant horrendous roaming charges too.  With the GPS there's no ongoing user cost like that an coverage is everywhere and always as long as you can access the satellites.
Here's the picture I took with the Magellan gps of Gilbert scanning the woods for game.

nikon coolpix android

This is the latest nikon coolpix.It is definitely revolutionary. I have enjoyed 2 generations of the coolpix before especially liking the 18x zoom
edition that came out a year or so ago.This android has 10x zoom and 16 megapixels. My iphone has a 5 megapix camera so this is definiyely much more camera as I'd expect from Nikon. There really is a whole lot of other stuff here like browser and gps and maps as well. With all the incredile goodies it will take thought to remember this is primarily a very sophisticated camera. It  certainly is sexy. I got it for travel where i dont want to take the really big and fancy nikon that seems to broadcast tourist and thief alert. This sweet ma hine can go anywhere with me and only attract attention when do what im doing now. Small is beautiful.

Garmin Nuvi 2595LMT GPS

I bought my Garmin Nuvi 2595 LMT GPS at Best Buy for approximated $250.  I'm a sailor and have been depending on Garmin for decades without fault. I've also a backwoods garmin for wilderness camping and hunting.  I was glad they made these portable ones for the car which could be attached to the dashboard with a suction cup. I've a Mazda Miata and Ford F350 truck so liked that I'd be able to transfer my gps from one vehicle to another.
The car gps is way superior to the other gps for it's function.  The display is visible with very little distraction from driving.  In addition there is a voice feature. A comedian did a very humorous sketch of his love for his gps lady.  She sounds like a school teacher.  When I plot in my route by declaring my destination she tells me where to turn and prompts me about upcoming turns.  A little vehicle on the screen shows me driving along the grid with names of roads displayed.
Richmond BC is a blackhole bermuda triangle.  It's been one of the areas of largest growth in the Vancouver Canada region because the realtors have ensured there is no signage on the streets that can take you back to 99 south.  Once you leave the highway you enter a vortex Maze. Most people give up and just buy property and live there.  This has been especially true for Chinese people who come to Richmond to visit family and can never return.  I've made it in and out on several occasions with only hours of loss of life and heart felt prayer.  I can say today that the Garmin Nuvi guided me out of this place where dragons be on  the shortest but wholly counter intuitive route.  This was especially appreciated  as the Hitchcock  birds had eaten  the bread crumbs I'd strewn behind the car as I entered Richmond.
On the I5 the Garmin guided me across 4 lanes near Everett and took me off the freeway on the most convoluted exit to get me to the Best Western Navigator late at night.
There are accessories too. Blue tooth for adding your phone.  An interesting audio book feature which comes loaded with a Bill Bryson sample. Great choice.  There's several other apps including calculator and currency exchange which I don't need but are added features.  It came loaded with maps for US and Canada and more can be loaded.  Further I can get these updated as part of the Best Buy Garmin package for free. Warranty for a year.
In the convertible the volume for my older ears could be better but it's adequate. With the roof up it works just fine.  The limitation is the audio books with the roof down. So I'd like a little more audio boost if I could.  It finds a variety of commerical places so far the best being gas stations. Lost in Richmond needing gas I used this feature and it took me to the nearest gas station. Now that's a treat!. It's weakness was in just navigating to another city.  I kept entering Seatle and it wanted a specific location in Seatle.  So I'd personally like a less specific search criteria for plotting. Maybe it's in the garmin but so far it's been so idiot proof I haven't had to read the instructions.  I might read them to find out how I can do this without knowing a specific place in the town. That's just how I travel across country town to town.  However I have a list of restaurants in the Garmin.  We inputted Best Western Navigator in Everett and that got us here.  We'd been to Best Western Navigator and liked it. I'd have liked a hotel app feature rather than restaurants.  But I just have to input the hotel chain and town so it's pretty simple. In addition to finding gas stations it finds other things of every day living like laundry.
Having used a Garmin gps fish finder I know I can input into the memory favourite places myself. I just haven't figured how to do this and again may actually have to read the instructions. When I was trying to read the instructions and input the garmin on the dashboards with both hands while driving Laura grabbed hold of her door handle. I have noticed that that's her indication to me that she's panicked.  I later read in the instructions specific notice  to avoid just what I was trying to do.  It's recommended that one pull over to the side of road and put in the text instruction for the destination while the vehicle is stopped. This naturally takes all the risk and fun out of driving with a gps but likely contributes to getting one to ones destination too.