Anyone hiking with handheld GPS?

Madlyn Fallis: Your probably should have gotten out of your car and at least gotten your boots dirty once or twice before buying a GPS. That GPS is not for keeping you on the trail. It is for coming back to that wonderful berry bush you found last summer and want to visit again this summer with a bigger berry bucket. It's for going back to the rock pile you found last 4th of July weekend - and your geology professor is pissing kittens to get another sample. When you miraculously roll head down a steep hill unhurt and are now blazing a trail back to your car - this I when the gps is a big help, and, an even bigger help when your trail blazing abilities fail and you need to call for help. Now - unless you mate that datum inside your GPS with an actual map in your hot little hand - you will off by 50-900 yards. Most smart people will buy a topgraphic maps of the areas they intend to hike or visit - then bring these into the store that sells gps's and ask to see models t! hat have those map's datums. Think of this as a calibration. It's when a guy like you gets lost - and they go grab a fresh pack of batteries and fire up the new GPS...... this where you read about them in the paper walking off a cliff or their body is being recovered by a hard to access revene. You need to know how to use it before you need it. You step outside your front door and notice the GPS is saying you are half a mile north and a quarter mile east of where you really are - you need resolve this in the until datum. You cannot resolve this when you are already lost. You gotta know how to use it and how it works while standing in a known place at a known altitude. On the bright side - it sounds like you spend the big $$ for a very nice one. This should server you well for a very, very long time. I have nice one from 10 years ago and it is most definitely not outdated like the cheaper ones from that year.Try not to get frustrated with it. For decades I owned a 4! 0' wooden sloop I sailed from Portland Maine to Nantucket, aro! und Martha's Vineyard and up though the Cape Cod Canal with no radar, no loran, no GPS. I am very good with a chart. However, that new GPS took me about two weeks before I was able to resolve all the errors it kept coming up with when I was using in known locations. One place it would be fine - 20 miles down the road it was a mile off...... the GPS was not the 'off' part because every time I came back to the spot it was always dead nuts on the same readings. it was the coordinates on the different maps I was using that were off. Like all things - it takes times to master....Show more

Truman Biby: This is the app I use to follow my trail and distance http://www.softdd.com/mobile/my-jogging-trail/inde...