Sunday, February 13, 2011

ARRRRGH!


I'd like to kill the person who invented GPS. A compass I can understand but apparently GPS is beyond me. First up on a "simple Etrex Legend Hcx", there are six buttons each of which is capable of 4,222 different operations. Yea like I'm going to remember all this crap. Here's a tip if a company uses more then 10 letters from the alphabet to name the product - it's a safe bet you don't want it.

MEN buy C A R S and T R U C K S. They don't buy, "Nissan 4Runners 4X4 V6 BS Extend Cab Hybrids XLC,TDI,SLR,SOBS. Those things are bought by focus group weenies.

So far I've saved possibly four different tracks from four different kayak trips I have recently made with this GPS. Or maybe not. Two of these I have successfully loaded onto Google Earth and published here. I think the other two have been up loaded to Google Mars. Being a potentially dry planet I'm rather proud of that achievement.

I have also down loaded two GPS mapping programs. One has a 13 page Tutorial written in an Ozie Greek dialect that is only spoken on Ratatunka. The others junk.

Don't be mistaken I'm not giving up on this.

Tomorrow morning after the sun has come up I'm climbing over the back fence and retrieving the GPS from my neighbours back yard. I'll strap it to the deck of the kayak, drive down to the ocean, go for a paddle, come home and attempt to upload some info and just like that my heart rate will go up and my blood pressure will peak.

But that's all good because I got the damn GPS to help be get my heart rate and exercise quotient up. Look at that speed 4.2 knots lets go for 4.3 So it's all good. Sort of. Oh by the way I paddled 9.78 nautical miles in 2hrs and 52 minutes, with a max speed of 5.5 Kts, an average speed of 3.4 kt and although it was a calm day with little current managed to gain 56 metres in elevation which is apparently how high my house is above sea level.

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