Sat navs are wonderful. I have no idea how they know exactly where I am or the way I need to go to get where I want to. They are an incredible invention except when they don't know about new roads and get very upset when you insist on driving through what they are convinced is a field.
And when they don't work at all of course and the driver has to fling himself on the mercy of the navigator.
'Which way do I go? Tell me quickly.'
'How am I supposed to know?'
'You have the map.'
'I don't know where we're going.'
'South west.'
Blank stare.
'Do I go left or right?'
'Left. Or maybe right. We need to go left but they drive on the other side here so maybe we go right.' (It made perfect sense at the time.)
Some time later.
'Are we on the right road now?'
'Um yes, I think so ... but we might be going the wrong way on it.'
Seventy-five minutes and a motorway toll later we were finally back where we started.
And we'd been on holiday for all of twelve hours ...
Better add navigating to ballroom dancing and kayaking as things Husband and I shouldn't do together.
It's not that I'm a bad navigator; I just get - oh, look we're going over a pretty river.
3 comments:
I can relate to this - we don't have sat nav and I am chief map reader - I like to get us lost though as you never know what discoveries you're going to find.
The trouble with SatNavs is that you tend to rely in them. Thus, when they lose reception, you have no idea where you are and so can't find yourself on the map.
Plus also, map-reading is becoming a lost art amongst the younger generation. Here in Germany it is no longer taught in schools. Just hikers and geocachers can still do it.
FWIW, as a flying instructor, I've noticed that about 1/4 to 1/3 of my students turn the map so they hold it in the direction we are flying. The rest can "turn" it in their heads and hold the map with north at the top. YMMV.
Almost noone (even sailors) can use a sextant any more and negligible numbers can navigate using a LORAN hyperbolic map :-(
Indeed, wherethejourneytakesme, I like to call them scenic detours.
Stu, I like the map to be the same direction as me. Ideally they would paint roads different colours too.
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