Garmin Quest - Road Test

 From: Brian Whiting - Wales

In the previous part I mentioned that a trip to France and Spain was planned and would report back on the event.

My friend and I were to visit the Picos de Europe in Northern Spain, staying at San Vicente de la Barquera and rather than go via the ferry to Santander, it was decided to spend a few days travelling across France instead.

Maps are of course a useful part of any journey, but we had invested in the Garmin Quest Sat/Nav and intended to put it to full use and see just how good it could be.

Our trip started in France at St Malo and took us on the first part to Poitiers via Rennes. Using the MapSouce loaded into the PC we selected our route and inserted the 'way points' needed to guide us on our way, and then transferred the information into the Quest.

En-route we encountered a problem near Rennes in that the directions took us off the route and instructed us to return on the other carriageway back towards St Malo. At this point, due to traffic we lost contact with each other and only meet up again by chance. This could have had disastrous consequences. We agreed to override the GPS and got back onto our planned route, and after the system had 'recalculated' us back onto our correct route the remainder of the journey was straight forward.

A check of the route on the Quest showed that we had put the 'waypoint' in at what we thought was the correct place. However upon return home a closer inspection on the PC showed that although we had selected the route (see image on right) we had infact placed the 'way point' onto the wrong carriageway. So when planning your route be careful to zoom in and make sure that it has been placed onto the correct direction of travel in the event that the road is not a normal single carriageway.

The GPS was correct - we were wrong - as the image left shows as by putting the 'way point' on the wrong side of the dual-carriageway we were in fact instructing the system to put us into a loop of that section of the road. Because of this the unit had correctly selected the route - image right.

Without this later knowledge we became sceptical of the system and were not prepared to trust the instructions being given.

As the journey progressed over the next 2 sections to Perigueux and Pau we became more confident and began to rely on the information being given. This proved excellent in the center of large towns Like Bergerac and Pau where we were taken through without a hitch.

One thing we became careful of was to watch the screen in relation to the spoken instructions. For example in towns to be told "In 400 feet, turn right" takes a bit of judgement with so may side turnings, but once we became confident to use the screens small black arrow position locator to show us exactly where the junction was in relation to our place on the road, then there was no difficulty.

The system was even able to take us directly to the Formule 1 Motel in the center of the towns we stayed at without any difficulty.

One important thing to remember is that the unit is designed for use by all those on the move. Walking, riding, cycling and also normal road vehicles, as was to prove the case on a couple of roundabouts. One instruction was to take the second exit. A look at the road sign as we approached showed this as a left turn when we needed to continue straight ahead, where in fact the actual road exit we required appeared on the road to be the first one. What we had not taken into account was the small track that went off to the right before the main road we required.

Again the system was correct, as it was in Pau. The instruction was to take the 6th exit. After passing 4, I noticed that what I thought was the last one was only the 5th exit. The 6th being the road back the way we had come. However I had not spotted on entering the junction that there was a cycle track to my immediate right as the 1st exit.  If I had looked more closely at the screen when joining then I would have spotted the track, but when approaching a busy junction most of your attention needs to be looking for problems, not always directions. At times like this a pillion passenger would have been useful.

The major fault we found was in the mountains where it at times got confused and tried to make us turn off where no road existed, sometimes only a long drop of a few thousand feet. We even did a full 360 degree trip around one town! We again put this down to the proximity of the mountains themselves blocking the satellites and reverted to the use of the roadside signposts for the remainder of this part of the journey until we got down to a lower and more open level where the system kicked in again to get us back to base.

The system should always be used in conjunction with the roadsigns where new roads are being put in as is happening a lot in France and Spain. Many villages are having by-passes built and you are told that you are "off-route" with the screen showning you in open fields. Once we were told to "continue for 6.4 miles and enter roundabout". During  this section we went through 4 new roundabouts that were not shown on the GPS. These will probably be include in the next map update.

Over the course of the 10 day holiday we never had a map on the tank to follow (only using one each night to check, and make a mental picture, of the next days journey) and once we had got used to the system we allowed it to take us to our destinations without any more confusion. The information displayed on the screen was clear and easy to follow enhanced by the distinct spoken directions.

Having used the system now in many different situations, and learnt how to use the information being spoken in relation to the on screen display, I would not hesitate to rely on it in the future. St Malo to the north of Spain and home - albeit via the return ferry - a total of 1606 miles without the constant use of a map was quite an achievement.

Sometime modern technology can be too good. I well remember the days of having to rely on a map and getting lost and finding some delightful little towns and villages. But that's another story.