My GPS – But first, a little history…

A brief bit of background… I’ve been using a GPS since 1995, when I purchased a (now) vintage old Garmin GPS 40 for my father.

I had been convinced for some time that I really wanted one and, equally, was convinced that I had no practical use for it. I rarely got the opportunity to go hiking and car navigation GPSes were still the thing of science fiction. On the other hand, I was positive that my father, who, at that time, went camping and hiking some 25 weeks out of the year, was a perfect candidate for one.

The problem: He wasn’t at all convinced they had any use.

After several attempts, over several months, to talk about the technology and get my dad interest had completely failed, I decided to buy him one, anyway. I figured if he decided he didn’t like it, I’d keep it. After he took the GPS out for his first trip, there was no chance I was going to get to keep it.

My dad can be stubborn, but he’ll usually admit when he’s wrong (except about global warming), and he came back from the first trip raving about how much fun it was to have a GPS. He wouldn’t dream of going out to the woods without it anymore.

I could hardly have chosen and more appreciated or successful birthday gift for me father. Picking gifts for my father is historically almost impossible to get right. I’ve only ever gotten him three gifts that I genuinely feel he’s enthused after (Two GPSes and one Apple Mac) so I was pleased with his reaction, but I still didn’t have my own GPS.

In 2000, I purchased a Garmin eTrex for my father to replace the aging GPS 40. The eTrex was still a basic unit, but expanded to a 12-channel receiver (up from the GPS 40’s 8 channel receiver.) The improvement in signal acquisition and accuracy was as dramatic as night and day.

In 2001, I took this newer unit with us to Japan and Taiwan and I loved it. It’s really a comfort in a place like Japan where we had no knowledge of the area, no locals to help up and only my incompetent Japanese skills and my wife’s ability to read Chinese characters. Even if it is miles and miles away, there’s something reassuring about having a “fix” on your hotel, or the subway station you arrived at.

I’ve logged quite a few hours using both my dad’s GPSes over the years, but they were both “basic” units without any of the cooler bells & whistles available on higher end models. If I was ever going to get a GPS of my own, I had different requirements than my dad…

[Stay tuned for part two.]

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