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Getting Around

Getting Around can be easy with the right tools

We arrived in London and after buying a car we had to decide how we were going to find our way around Europe.

We had every possible Lonely Planet book of the countries we were going to be visiting and are essential for any travel because they tell you the good and bad, however they weren't the answer to getting around the city's and small country towns.

Finding our way around lots of cities could be difficult as we needed to find specific addresses of Coushsurfers and house swap arrangements, so unless we either carried a trailer load of maps or purchased a Satellite Navigation unit it would be tricky.

We were a little concerned as GPS’s were quite expensive and we weren’t tech heads but we could see the real advantages. Anyway in the end we bought a Garmin.

Once we worked out how to use it and this didn’t take long, we had quite a lot of fun.

Garmin nüvi 1250 - GPS receiver. Sold Individually

We also had a few other gadgets that we needed to charge, so we bought a cigarette lighter adapter to accommodate three plugs at once.

The GPS would estimate the exact time of arrival at our destination even though the trip was 500 miles long. It showed our true speed and warned us of fixed speed cameras and the local speed limits. It listed all types of shops and services and even showed latitude, longitude and altitude!

We gave it a few challenges and it always worked them out. Couchsurfers in the south of Spain didn't have street numbers so they gave Latitude and Longitude and again it took us right to their door.

We occasionally wondered if the Garmin had lost its mind because it would direct us along the back roads and goat tracks of Italy. We had set it on 'most direct route' so it just took us on the shortest track.

We took a car ferry across the Adriatic Sea and I sat on the top deck watching the sat. nav. try to correct the ships course to Croatia. It was upset because we were not taking a straight line to Split.

In Poland a similar thing happened because we were directed along farmers tracks around wheat fields and came across local people wearing their traditional dress.

When we were about 300 kilometers from Berlin we entered the address of our House Exchange hosts and arrived at their driveway exactly on time as predicted.

We finally returned to England and because its maps were only of Europe we had to sell it. It was sad to say goodbye to a device which worked with us everyday and enabled us to look at the countryside rather than maps all the time.

It takes the stress out of map reading and you know what they say about couples and map reading! .......aurguments and why do women turn maps upside down. My wife says “what does it matter if we still get there”.

Back in Australia I saw the same little machine available for $135 and so we used the new one for a long trip up the east coast of Oz.. Our Garmin was great but there are many other brands available.

I would highly recommend a GPS unit if you are touring in other countries because it does make getting around so much easier although you will still need some maps to plot your course.

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