Posted on Monday, May 18, 2009 6:56 AM
It's a well-known fact that I have the navigational skills of a cinder block; I lost my way more than a few times in both Europe and Japan, but mostly at night time.
Therefore, I did a little experiment on my last trip in February with a GPS navigation system from Garmin I borrowed from a friend. Seeing that my TomTom car navi has served me very well in the past, I wanted to see whether something like that would come in handy.
Obviously, I could have taken my TT with me, but TomTom does not have any maps for Japan, as it's a niche market for European companies. It's also not suitable to make waypoints quickly or geotagging.
Add that to the fact that it has the battery life of a 20 year old cell phone, and you'll see why that's not an option.
The Japanese have plenty of GPS navi's, but they are primarily car navi's with some handhelds thrown in the mix (modern telephones have GPS nowadays, but you'll need a data plan for those which do not cost an arm and a leg per MB), and separate navi's are quite expensive and obviously all in Japanese.
So when I could borrow my friend's Garmin (on the left here), I grabbed the opportunity with both hands, and I was not disappointed.
Obviously, it didn't have a Japanese map on it, but I found out later that there is one for sale which fits the Garmin. The lack of map wasn't a big problem, though; the device still let's you know where you are, and if you create waypoints and go walkies, the devices tells you exactly how far you have to walk to get back there.
Excellent if you go to someplace unknown, and you'd otherwise be in a bind when trying to get back to the station to catch the last train back.
I had that once in Ito, late at night. Caught the last train with only a minute or so to spare because I got lost.
I got the 60CSX in this post; it has a compass, all sorts of information on tides, sunrise and -set, maps and it's water- and dust proof to some extent, and works for 18 hours straight on one set of AA batteries.
For comparison: My TT only works for two hours on its internal battery, so I'm quite happy with it.
It will not replace my TT however, simply because the TT has traffic info, maps for the TT are cheaper and it's readability while driving is a lot better due to the large screen. The Garmin is more suitable for outdoor stuff.
Cheers, K.