Well, my son can be a tad special at times, and yesterday was a classic example. His navigation skills are sadly lacking, and no amount of technology can help him.
He did in fact have two GPS enabled iPads in the car, and a iPhone, with a passenger that not only could use the iPad mapping stuff, but also, supposedly, knew the way.
However, we just knew to sit there is costa in Harlow and check on latitude and see that he had whizzed round the M25, missing the M4, the A30 and M3 exits, any of which would have worked, and was half way to Addlestone.
Apparently the phone calls were not appreciated, as my daughter (who was following him) had already called and suggested that maybe he should have turned off the motorway by now.
Hopefully he'll grow out of it - I was almost as bad when I was young, cycling to Evesham when I was trying to get to Malvern. But that was in the days before GPS and mobile phones so I have some excuse :-)
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No amount of technology helps if you only notice your turning when doing 70 mph in the rightmost lane (damned congested motorways) with 100 yards to go - you are just not going to be able to make it from the rightmost lane to the exit in that distance.
ReplyDeleteI started navigating in rallies (well, treasure-hunts really) when I was 15. I had to map-read ahead so I could tell the driver where to turn before we got there, and also plot the route ahead of that. I have no idea how I multi-tasked like that, against the clock - I don't think I could do it now!
ReplyDeleteIt was only some time later that I realised that the Paxolin map-board I used, and the fact that this was before seatbelts, would have meant I'd have been cut in half if we'd had an accident!
Ah, the carefree days of youth... :-) We used to win quite a lot, too!
Cheers, Howard
Farnz, some sat-nav's leave it way to late to tell you which exit you need.
ReplyDeleteparticularly when approaching roundabouts
I'm going to beat you, you said i hadn't missed the M4 yet (which is the one I was aiming for) but I'd already turned around because jacqueline rang and said I'd missed a sign that said Wokingham which actually said WOKING. So if neither of you had called me I'd have just carried on, got the M4 and been fine and home way earlier!
ReplyDeleteI said you missed the M4, A30, and M3. Want me to find the call recording :-)
ReplyDeleteDragon,
ReplyDeleteIME, while the Sat Nav may not wake up and say "in 5 kilometres, exit left", you have plenty of opportunity to work it out in advance - for starters, I've never seen a unit that doesn't have a "distance to next instruction" display.
For seconds, if you've looked up the route in advance, and have a rough idea where you're going, you know that you're probably going to want to come off at a particular junction number - signs for the junction before tip you off that you should probably start aiming to move across now, not be caught out when your satnav says "in 50 metres, leave the motorway".
For thirds, modern satnavs not only tell you which exit to take, they also have a graphical display with the map on it - you can look at that and make a judgement call about lanes and exits.
Maybe if they slowed down on the motorway they could have stood a chance of reading the motorway signs lol xxxx
ReplyDelete