Yup, was a Garmin. Part of me has been a little worried cause i can’t find my way anywhere without GPS anymore, and Google has been getting shittier every day.
Hell, I remember the first time I used maps on a computer to plan and print a route, and the first time I could do it online with MapQuest.
Those were moments that the Internet really felt like the future.
I used to tape maps to the gas tank of my motorcycle on trips.
Then mapquest became useful and I taped printed directions. Made it a lot easier.
Then I got a Garmin waterproof, handlebar mounted GPS and it was glorious, though you had to buy map updates every couple years.
Eventually phones were actually able to be used for directions and I kept a phone connected to a homemade battery pack in my jacket pocket, with an earbud under my helmet, so I just listened to directions and music.
Finally got a phone connected to a handlebar mount, plugged into the bike power, with a Bluetooth headset built into the helmet. Probably the least safe of the options, but I can listen to podcasts, audiobooks, music and see the maps while it directs me with audio, just like a car display would.
I rode from the UK to northern Italy with nothing but an early hiking go’s unit that had no map. Just an arrow pointing to Torino. The trip over the Alps was very random.
I’m still not sure how i found anything before gps was a thing. I remember getting my licence and my first trip with a friend. He printed out like 20 pages of google maps. He sat next to me and went through it like a person wo went mad on the nautilus. Halfway through it, he threw it all on the backseat and only kept the last page and said: "we’re looking for some place that sounds like hitler and then 15 min later we go left and there is a house with a dragon in the yard.
We never took a wrong turn on the whole trip. Same at work, i would get a bad printout of a city block where i wasn’t even sure where it was. And somehow after driving around in circles for a bit i would always magically find it.
Didn’t mapquest get sued for routing people through a dangerous neighborhood? Then they started putting a disclaimer?
It tells you which direction something is in, but can’t help plot a route to get there.
Nice device!
I still remember printing out google maps directions, then missing one turn and then being completely lost.
The number of times I had to stop and recalibrate with the paper map was high!
I used to geocache this way because I couldn’t afford a GPS. Finding caches took some time!
Yep. Seemed pretty shiny compared to printing off directions from MapQuest. Then we figured out how to customize the voice, and it was shenanigans from there.
Man, TomTom had some kickass ones. Vader was on mine for too long.
I remember how tedious using maps to get anywhere was.
Last week I traveled through some rural desert backroads and Apple Maps got me there no problem, but it had taken me on an indirect route. As I was driving I discovered that it was because a number of the roads were completely closed. If I had been using maps I would have had to stop and figure out the detours on my own.
Hertz rent a car on a business trip. It was this little box with a yellow display that would ding when it was time to turn. I thought it was so cool!
Garmin nuvi 250, and then shortly after that a Garmin Nuvi 500, which I still use almost every day when I drive.
Almost 20 years old.
Yes. I was prepared though, I had directions from Mapquest printed out and ready to go in case it messed up. I was using an early-gen Garmin GPS that was just a GPS. It did mess up quite a bit, and I had to take it inside, plug it into my computer to update maps. It also could only hold so much, so I had to limit the maps I had available to just my city.
I first used MapQuest in HS (2000) and it took us so far out of the way just to use a main road.
I remember shitting on a friend 3ndlessly for his dependency on his Garmin style GPS. The go to was that he couldn’t find his own dick with out his GPS. One day it’s just the two of us coming back from the city. He’s yelling at me to use the GPS as I was the passenger but being the asshole I am refused to turn it on and told him if he cant find the two turns to get on the expressway than we weren’t meant to go home. We’ll fuck me if he didn’t fuck up missing every on ramp which then led to him trying to just stay under the overpasses hoping to run into another on ramp. Finally I decided to fold and give him directions when he actually turns onto the walking path that takes pedestrians along the water front 🤣🤣🤣 fucking worth every minute we wasted. Motherfucker could lift a ton, but was too dumb to spell it.🤣
I don’t make the cut since I’m 33 but I remember being 10 and my dad had a directional only GPS where you could put down coordinates of a place and get the direction needed to go towards it.
I had the GPS and my dad was winging it without a map and me asked his friend if it’s left or right and I said the GPS pointed to the right or whatever when they would he guessed left. They went for it and I navigated couple of roads and found a shorter path.
It’s a pretty nice memory I have of my dad which passed away 8 years ago. Thanks for reminding me
Yes. I took a trip to Ireland and rented a car. I had a Garmin GPS unit which I purchased for the trip and was extremely helpful.
I remember the first time I saw GPS units at the electronics store. It seemed like some crazy military grade thing from a movie.
I couldn’t tell you the specifics, but back in the 1990’s, we had GPS devices that just had an LCD read-out of your latitude and longitude, so you could find your position on a paper map. They were on the market as survey devices, but were also useful for wilderness travelers.
It’s hard to recall exact dates, because the devices developed incrementally, and navigation mode on Google Maps didn’t spring into existence ask at once.
I do, the GPS maps was of course outdated, and brought us to the most random mud trail in the area.
It had potential, but definitely a lot of things to improve.
Yep. Borrowed the GPS head unit (Garmin, I think) from my cousin with money for a road trip to SF.
I remember that it worked great until we got to the city itself, then the buildings made it hard to get line of site to 3 satellites. So we ended up printing a bunch of maps from our hotel’s business center anyway. But it got us there and made it easier to find gas stations along the way.
I remember the first time I used one, but not for technically getting anywhere. It was the mid 90s I think, childhood memories are hard to place exactly.
My dad bought a GPS device for work and let me play with it a little. It was an even older model from the late 80s probably. Alphanumeric display only, it couldn’t even draw an arrow let alone a map.
I tried to follow the instructions from the manual to make it do something. I remember wanting to navigate to the other end of the back yard. But the manual was all in English and I couldn’t figure it out in the end.
