Umbria via GPS
I bought one. It’s not anything fancy or complicated, but it has a map of Europe and says it will do a number of things. The problem has been that I have to learn how to make it do them, because the instructions are the sketchiest I’ve ever seen. It says, for example, touch this to find a list of audio files then touch to select one and play it. It just doesn’t say how to get audio (nor video nor photo) files into it. I tried connecting it to the computer because that seemed like a possible way, but all that did was recharge the battery.
I tend to love a challenge, but it turns out my favorite time to tackle one is not when speeding down the super highway at 62.4 miles per hour.
I took my new GPS with me for a short trip south. I picked a place I know how to get to so I could learn what GPS could do for me and I for it without ending up in Slovenia. That was partially successful, although I could possibly be convinced that the reason I didn’t reach Slovenia was because I went south and Slovenia is northeast.
photo from “How Stuff Works” page on Umbrian wine.
Someone with a sense of humor apparently fleshed out the Italian map part of the GPS program. It was hard to appreciate the joke. As I left my friends’ home, I was led to make a left onto an unpaved road leading up a hill… wow! adventure ahead, right? Left, right, up and down; the advantages to this route were hard to see, but they eventually brought me to a roadblock manned by the Carabinieri. This is the second time since 1973 that I have run into a police roadblock in Italy. It didn’t feel like an error. I am fortunate that at this moment all my documentation is spotlessly perfect so I was on my way in moments, but that’s not always true and besides, as soon as I cleared the roadblock the GPS completely lost it. The next turn demanded was a rocky track that led past three houses and ended. That began a series of crazy instructions. At one place there was even a big sign saying “Perugia” but the GPS demanded a different road, a road which after two right turns and a two lefts brought me back to the road I would have been on had I followed the sign. In a remote country area I was told to turn right and make an immediate second right. I made the first one into a churchyard where there was also a gift shop, but the second right would have had me crashing through the nave wall of the historic church so I didn’t do it.
I was led down three other private driveways and encouraged into a dead end which I refused when I saw the no exit sign. I also refused to enter a track with a rocky center higher than that required to rip off my oil pan. At a few points along the E45 I was urged off, through a town center, around some roundabouts and then back onto the superhighway.
I admit that I saw views and vistas I’ve never before seen. I know now where several hilltowns are that previously were only names on highways signs.
When I was setting up my new GPS I had to choose a voice to give me directions. I listened to all on offer to find the one I heard the clearest. She’s a classic posh Brit voice, but after yesterday I don’t trust her any more.
Yeah, trusting Posh Spice may have been your first mistake. Or wait…did I read that wrong? ;) So funny that my mom told me she ordered a GPS yesterday; must be something in the air!
Yeah, Posh also told me to wear a bandage dress. Do you think I should?
That scenario right there is why I cannot feel comfortable enough to trust a GPS.
I like how it took you somewhere new, ie. got you lost, ie. did its job wrong.
When I take a wrong turn and I’m faced with a roadblock of policemen, cows, rubble or dung (I might be projecting about Yorkshire here), or when I turn a corner and burst through a dry-stone wall to plunge 400 feet into a dry canyon, I’d like to think that my last thought would be a sense of satisfaction that it was, at least, my own fault, and not some disembodied plummy voice programmed in by an overworked nerd with one eye on his World Of Warcraft character.
Plus, maps are gorgeous. And maps feel right. Even though they’re much more hassle and are often just as unreliable.
I know, I’m a geek that’s arguing against technology here. Hmm.
Your experiences are exactly the reason I hesitate to take the GPS plunge! Having one in a strange US city is one thing, but using GPS on country roads in Italy is quite another. I’m still on the fence…
Our GPS gives us a number of alternative paths to choose from (as an example we used it when going south last week and it showed us two ways; one was longer but faster and the other was shorter but slower). We can also tell it to avoid highways, to take only scenic roads etc etc etc. Very nice, and it has proven to give us accurate directions 99% of the time.
I actually refused to drive until we got a GPS: i wasn’t willng to be lost in a foreign country while my children were waiting to be picked up. There seem to be some characteristic problems: it sends me one way when I know a shortcut, it makes an error on the way from Muenster to Berlin, which we don’t ever follow, but all in all, it’s a wonderful resource. Before we do really big trips, I like to make a first check on a big map, but that’s also to know what general directions should look like.
I really do think someone deliberately screwed up the area I was driving through, or maybe all of Italy? Who knows? It’s otherwise not on that three satellites together would send me to driveways and off highways and through towns then back on the same highway.
Annika, Mine will do fastest, no highweays or shortest, your choice. I chose shortest yesterday. Hah!
In US, I love my GPS. When I screw up and get in the wrong lane, miss a turn or whatever, it reprograms, and sends me on my way.
We have a GPS unit. It’s tried to send us up pedestrian only streets (with steps!) and old mule trails. It is now relegated to the glove compartment.
Forgot to mention that I actually used our GPS a bit in Italy and it seemed to work ok. It found its way from Quercegrossa to the train station in Siena with no problem, but after that I didn’t have any addresses to anywhere we were going which rendered the GPS quite useless. Next time I will remember to print out all addresses before heading off.
Hee hee hee! Ahem. I mean, I’m sorry it didn’t work out for you.
it’s a wonderful resource. Before we do really big trips, I like to make a first check on a big map, but that’s also to know what general directions should look like.