Why? • Features • How they're used • Plane & Pilot review • Learn to use your GPS

About the Companions:
Learn to Use your GPS!

No matter what kind of GPS you have or what kind of navigating you do, the Companions can probably help you do it better. And that starts with learning how to use your GPS.

As you probably know, your GPS can tell your position easily. But, if you are standing still, you can't use GPS to tell which way is North. Only when you begin to move, does your GPS have a sense of direction. By looking at your current and recent position data it figures out which way you are traveling. That's why, just a few seconds after you stop moving the GPS display often begins to rotate. It still knows your position, but it no longer has enough information to tell direction.

This leads directly to my suggestion that the ULTIMATE place to learn how to use every feature on any hand held GPS is the passenger seat of an automobile on a long cross-country trip. Get out the manual, plug into the cigarette adapter, and explore every function your GPS has. But don't forget your GPS Companion. You'll need that to enter waypoints for a few small towns along your route to track your progress.

You'll notice that if you lay a straight-line course to some distant point along the Interstate, that the highway won't follow it exactly. That's perfect! You want to learn what your GPS display looks like when you are: 1) ON/OFF course, 2) OFF course, but getting closer, 3) OFF course and getting worse, etc., etc. You get the picture. And that's the point. You get the picture.

I not only use car travel to learn new features on my GPS, I also use it for refresher training. There is nothing worse than spending the first half of your fishing trip trying to remember how to run your GPS. And there is little more dangerous than fumbling with your GPS while flying an airplane in congested airspace.

You'll find that navigating is actually an enjoyable pastime on long car trips. And you'll always be able to answer the perpetual questions of family travel: "How much farther is it?" and "When are we gonna be there?"

The best way to learn is by doing!

Your GPS can help you navigage the poorly marked backroads in your fishing and hunting territory. It is especially useful at night! But your GPS is also a more powerful trip computer than any car because it KNOWS where you are!

Here's how I use a portable GPS and a GPS Companion for nearly all my trips. Before departure, I take a few minutes to enter the coordinates of 4-6 points and include the points in a single route. On my map display I see a graphic looking just like my route on the map. The GPS instantly gives me my trip mileage within 2-3%.

This trip begins at the bottom of the map at left; the yellow line shows the route.

• Leg 1 (Lino Lakes to Moose Lake): As soon as we are under way the GPS begins to calculate our ETA (Estimated Time of Arrival). Because this leg is easy and familiar, we choose a very long segment. Still, we are never more than 3 miles off course. As well as tracking our speed and progress, the GPS also warns us as we approach our exit.
• Leg 2 (Moose Lake to Kettle River): Here we want to be sure we find the correct turn. Our VMG (Velocity Made Good) steadily counts down to zero as we approach our turn. At the intersection, our course indicator clearly indicates a right turn.
• Leg 3 (Kettle River to Floodwood): Now our concern is catching all the turns on this road. According to the map, we should never be more than 1.5 miles off the course line. Using our course deviation indicator at its standard setting of +- 2.5 miles, we will know immediately if we have strayed. At the same time our ETA display is accurately predicting lunch.
• Leg 4 (Floodwood to Meadowlands): Here we choose the moving map display to monitor progress. It neatly draws a graphic just like the map.
• Leg 5 (Meadowlands to Payne): Here again we need to find the correct intersection. The map shows only one road going North in the area. One the ground it's rarely that simple. Again the CDI cleary points out the correct northbound road and we drive straight to our destination!

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