Getting Lost with the Help of a GPS
Once a few years ago I read about a family that got lost on a remote mountain road, stuck in high snow drifts, and froze to death! It seems their GPS routed them on a mountain short cut that was only open during summer months. Once they were stuck they were too far from any help and their cell phones were out of the range of any towers. Can you imagine? I couldn't believe it. But apparently people blindly follow the directions of their GPS's quite often - even intelligent people like your Aunt Michele! Sometimes it takes more than once to learn a lesson! Read on...
The first time I remember getting really lost because of a goofy GPS was when we were first back in the States on a furlough in 2014. We hadn't been in the States but for a few weeks when we went to visit Uncle Randy and Aunt Renee near Walnut Cove, NC. We were to meet them at their church and then go to their house for lunch. We headed out of Reidsville towards US Highway 220 thinking we would head north and turn off near Madison. Somewhere in there we couldn't quite remember where to turn and decided to turn on the GPS. I found the address and name of the street where the church website said it was located and typed it into Granny's little unit. {Granny is the culprit of this story. She always gets lost with or without a GPS!}
Some the little voice starting talking to us and telling us where to turn and merge and all that stuff. It seemed to know where it was going and the path it was taking looked somewhat familiar. It did seem to be taking longer than usual and at some point when I thought we should take a left turn, Mr. GPS didn't say a thing!
Next thing you know Uncle Byron said - Is their church located in Virginia?
Oh, woe was me! I had been looking at the maps on the GPS and knew that something was wrong but what to do now was beyond my reasoning abilities for a few seconds. I said - Well, we better just pull over for a minute and look at a real map. Then I got the idea to see if we could find Walnut Cove on the GPS and just go there. Then I saw that the GPS had looked for the address in Virginia and not North Carolina. Seems the last time Granny had gone somewhere had been in Virginia and that where it had been left? Go figure!
We finally found the church just in time for the 11:00 o'clock service. We had missed Sunday School! But we were there and all was okay.
More recently Mrs. Navigator Michele helped to get us all really lost coming out of Salvador, the capital city of our state - Bahia, here in Brazil. We always get lost coming in and out of Salvador. Once we went around and around a shopping mall over and over again trying to find the right exit to go back to our hotel. It was a never ending story! Another time we ended up in the middle of a really bad neighborhood but finally stopped to ask some taxi drivers how to get to the big highway. One of them actually drove ahead of us and all we had to do was follow him. Seems they hear that question a lot! But on this trip I was armed and ready! I had studied Google Maps, a real map, and had the data turned on my cell phone to use a GPS on my phone!
We had gone to pick up Kerri and William this June to bring them back to Sobradinho. We were getting a late start out of town and it was getting close to lunch time. But some of us were determined to get out of town before stopping for lunch. That was mistake #1. Mistake #2 was listening to Aunt Michele and the GPS.
On the way to Salvador I had played with the device on my phone and saw that it routed us a long way around to get to the city from our house. On the way out it was doing the same thing but I had forgotten about that little glitch and just listened to Mr. GPS giving out his orders. I was concerned right away as we didn't head out the way we had come in, but hey GPS's ought to know their stuff, right?
After a nice drive all around the bottom lower side of Salvador - it's a peninsula, by the way. Uncle Byron was sure we were far from the highway we really wanted. And he was very right. We stopped near a city park that was a piece of original native rainforest that might have been interesting to see on any other day. Once again we asked some people for directions. They routed us up and over the big hill that separates the lower city from the rest of the world. It was quite exciting. We ate the leftover bread and sandwich stuff I had in the cooler for lunch and finally found the big highway.
Sadly everybody else in the world had jumped on the highway at the same time as us trying to get out of town for a big holiday weekend. Traffic was horrible and almost standstill for hours. If only we'd gone the right way first we might have missed it all. Who's to say?
Later on our big trip with Kerri when we went to Fortaleza and had to go to some difficult places downtown, we were privileged to take a former city bus driver along to show us where to go. He was much nicer and funner than Mr. GPS. We didn't get lost at all!
Lessons learned:
The first time I remember getting really lost because of a goofy GPS was when we were first back in the States on a furlough in 2014. We hadn't been in the States but for a few weeks when we went to visit Uncle Randy and Aunt Renee near Walnut Cove, NC. We were to meet them at their church and then go to their house for lunch. We headed out of Reidsville towards US Highway 220 thinking we would head north and turn off near Madison. Somewhere in there we couldn't quite remember where to turn and decided to turn on the GPS. I found the address and name of the street where the church website said it was located and typed it into Granny's little unit. {Granny is the culprit of this story. She always gets lost with or without a GPS!}
Some the little voice starting talking to us and telling us where to turn and merge and all that stuff. It seemed to know where it was going and the path it was taking looked somewhat familiar. It did seem to be taking longer than usual and at some point when I thought we should take a left turn, Mr. GPS didn't say a thing!
Next thing you know Uncle Byron said - Is their church located in Virginia?
Oh, woe was me! I had been looking at the maps on the GPS and knew that something was wrong but what to do now was beyond my reasoning abilities for a few seconds. I said - Well, we better just pull over for a minute and look at a real map. Then I got the idea to see if we could find Walnut Cove on the GPS and just go there. Then I saw that the GPS had looked for the address in Virginia and not North Carolina. Seems the last time Granny had gone somewhere had been in Virginia and that where it had been left? Go figure!
We finally found the church just in time for the 11:00 o'clock service. We had missed Sunday School! But we were there and all was okay.
More recently Mrs. Navigator Michele helped to get us all really lost coming out of Salvador, the capital city of our state - Bahia, here in Brazil. We always get lost coming in and out of Salvador. Once we went around and around a shopping mall over and over again trying to find the right exit to go back to our hotel. It was a never ending story! Another time we ended up in the middle of a really bad neighborhood but finally stopped to ask some taxi drivers how to get to the big highway. One of them actually drove ahead of us and all we had to do was follow him. Seems they hear that question a lot! But on this trip I was armed and ready! I had studied Google Maps, a real map, and had the data turned on my cell phone to use a GPS on my phone!
We had gone to pick up Kerri and William this June to bring them back to Sobradinho. We were getting a late start out of town and it was getting close to lunch time. But some of us were determined to get out of town before stopping for lunch. That was mistake #1. Mistake #2 was listening to Aunt Michele and the GPS.
On the way to Salvador I had played with the device on my phone and saw that it routed us a long way around to get to the city from our house. On the way out it was doing the same thing but I had forgotten about that little glitch and just listened to Mr. GPS giving out his orders. I was concerned right away as we didn't head out the way we had come in, but hey GPS's ought to know their stuff, right?
After a nice drive all around the bottom lower side of Salvador - it's a peninsula, by the way. Uncle Byron was sure we were far from the highway we really wanted. And he was very right. We stopped near a city park that was a piece of original native rainforest that might have been interesting to see on any other day. Once again we asked some people for directions. They routed us up and over the big hill that separates the lower city from the rest of the world. It was quite exciting. We ate the leftover bread and sandwich stuff I had in the cooler for lunch and finally found the big highway.
Sadly everybody else in the world had jumped on the highway at the same time as us trying to get out of town for a big holiday weekend. Traffic was horrible and almost standstill for hours. If only we'd gone the right way first we might have missed it all. Who's to say?
Later on our big trip with Kerri when we went to Fortaleza and had to go to some difficult places downtown, we were privileged to take a former city bus driver along to show us where to go. He was much nicer and funner than Mr. GPS. We didn't get lost at all!
Lessons learned:
- Always check your GSP with a trustworthy map.
- Take a real map along just in case.
- Don't be afraid to ask real people for help.
- Take lots of food along on long trips.
- Stay happy!
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