Travelling all over in our little van, we found ourselves at Millmerran Qld.  Next stop was to be Esk.  Wanting to miss the heart of Toowoomba, we placed our trust in our TomTom GPS.

Good heavens!  If anyone is in the area and you want the ultimate challenge, try punching Millmerran to Esk into your GPS.  Back roads (no roadsigns), inaccurate distances etc etc.

The GPS was eventually consigned to the boot, possibly never to see the light of day again.  A few days ago it tried to direct us into a brick wall.  Technology... I love it.

From now I take the coward's way out - my faithful 2004 Australian Road Atlas.

PS... jimricho... you were right. Tingha was well worth the visit.

G'day Al,

Glad you enjoyed your stay around Inverell/Tingha etc.

Jim

PS: GPS is a useful aid provided one recognises its limitations and uses it in conjuntion with good ol' fashion paper maps.  Its directions are only as good as the mapping software which is usually third party sourced. (often Sensis)

Here's the route through Toowoomba on a Garmin Nuvi 765 (Sensis Software)





-- Edited by jimricho on Thursday 24th of June 2010 08:31:50 PM

I agree, nothing like using those map reading skills.

Common sense must come into it when using gps tom tom would if in Melbourne would you punch in Cairns and hope for the best. Or would you put in at town on the highway in which you wanted to travel on ,then put in the next stage of your trip best to use it has an aid

In my old garmin (something 320) When I left smithton in tassie I put in my destination, a street in 1770 - Queensland. I arrived 25 hrs and 40 minutes later (driving time) 10 meters from the street number I had entered. Even told me I needed to board the ferry but had to use some common sense going through melbourne due to oldmapping
cheers
blaze

I'm sure that sweet girl inside that little screen has never been to the places she is giving directions to

i usually put mine in stages sy sydney to adelaide, ill put the destination as where i want to be that nite

Milo that what i do

Lest you think I'm suggesting that the Garmin always gets it right in my previous post, heres the route it suggests for the Great Ocean Road from Warrnambool to Peterborough.  It suggests a bunch of little side roads around "The Cove" and an old Gt ocean Rd near Peterborough.....



Here's the correct route from Google Maps....





-- Edited by jimricho on Friday 25th of June 2010 08:01:11 AM

jimricho wrote:

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Lest you think I'm suggesting that the Garmin always gets it right in my previous post, heres the route it suggests for the Great Ocean Road from Warrnambool to Peterborough.  It suggests a bunch of little side roads around "The Cove" and an old Gt ocean Rd near Peterborough.....



Here's the correct route from Google Maps....





-- Edited by jimricho on Friday 25th of June 2010 08:01:11 AM

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I may be mistaken but comparing the 2 maps it could be that the Garmin route may be a little bit shorter at a glance. Maybe the Great Ocean Road was made not to be the shortest route but to be the most scenic route.
Also our GPS has a choice of selecting the 'quickest' route or the 'shortest' route which can be significantly different routes from each other.

Cheers
Jon

 

I just crack up the pronounciation of some places that i am familiar with eg Shepparton has the ar sound extended by the voice on nav man and names that have a ch that should be pronounced as a c sound come out very strange. In my home town nav has me living 2 blocks from where i am and my neighbour across the road lives in 2 places here and also 2 blocks away.

Well, we have a 'name' for our GPS - Suzie/Suzie Wong, depending on if she is right or w(r)ong. I have to admit though that she got us through Canberra with no worries last Christmas. When we first bought it, I thought hubby was making me 'redundant', but there have beeen times where we have neded my services with the paper maps. Will be interesting how we go with our next trip in a couple of weeks.

A poor tradesman always blames his tools. Check your settings.

Yes, I think you're right Hylda&Jon, in fact I figured that earlier this year when I was there although the "fastest route" option was wildly optimistic about the travelling speed on the little single lane back roads that were little more than laneways. The "fastest" option came up with the same route as the "shortest" option. There is no "stay on main road" option. There is an "avoid unsealed roads" option but that's not applicable in this case. If you want to really go on a "Cooks Tour" select the best fuel consumption option! Obviously navigating the GOR is pretty easy, just stay on B100 (Victoria's system of road numbering is very good) but the GPS is handy for anticipating turn-offs and distance to towns etc. I spent good money on this toy, I wanna use it!

Onedodger wrote:

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A poor tradesman always blames his tools.

Check your settings.

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What about his toys?

 

Our GPS 'Daisy' (due to her mooing at us if ever we drive over the speed limit) was a godsend in Canberra, also she did well in Sydney apart from leading us down a very bendy road which was dangerous for us with caravan in tow. In Bunderberg she played silly buggers with us on a couple of occasions also. At odd times she starts out a bit rough in the morning but we believe that may be due to her imbibing in the hard stuff a bit too much the night before.
Speaking about travelling the Great Ocean Road, the last 3 weeks were spent doing just that & we just updated our blog with pics etc if anyone wants to take a peak.

Cheers
Jon & Hylda.