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I’m not sure, but I think the tires are the same as for my mini-van … the compact spare!
nope … but yes
Spare Batteries (rechargable and standard just in case)
Very Small First Aid Kit
Small Flashlight
Small Glow Stick
Small Pocket Knife
A couple spare pencils and sheet of paper
Waterproof bag (for cell phone, palm when crossing deeper creeks)
Pepper SprayAll of the above are in a medium fanny pack … along with some geo-trinkets.
I also have my cell phone and my favorite pen, which are always on me.
I also bring my Palm (with cachemate) and a camera … which usually are on me, but sometimes end up in the fanny pack.We have a larger bag that’s always in the car when we’re caching … with “extras”, such as: a couple pairs of socks, a can of peanuts, more batteries, more trinkets, and a 50′ light weight rope.
The rope, comes along with us if we head out into a park/woods that I think might have steep climbs … not that this is an official climbing rope … just sometimes I use it sort of as a “handrail” for the wife and kids to get up behind me, but rarely does that happen.
Nope … Garmin’s in-car navigational units (at least the nuvi), have much less in the settings / setup functions.
The closest thing is “Map Detail” on the “Maps” setting … but it only effects to what detail level smaller streets show up.
Thanks for all the feedback … it’s amazing how much info we’re pulling together.
The concept about naming a 16×16 pixel with a .BMP name the same as the .GPX file does work great! It stands out much better having a cache symbol instead of a stupid dot. It works great when your navigating to a specific cache POI … I still wish they’d make them show up when your “just passing by” one, withOUT using the Alert function or zooming in to the 200 foot overhead view.
It’s becoming very obvious that Garmin treats the POIs very different than the FAVORITES. A POI seems to be a “locked” item you can delete one (you must delete the whole POI file) and you can’t change the name or symbol of a POI. However, if you have a POI on screen, you can hit [Save], thus turning it into a FAVORITE … at which point it behaves more like a traditional waypoint: you can see it in all views, you can delete it (just not in mass), you can change the name or symbol.
@hogrod wrote:
On my 60cx there is a mapsetting that does get the POIs to show up on the map, but only if you are zoomed close enough.
Wow, your right … but you have to really zoom way in (in the case of nuvi to the 200 foot range) and at that it only shows up on the over-view of the map, not in the normal 3D driving-view.
I’m not seeing any way to set an Icon choice, other than the little silver dot that the nuvi uses for POIs. The GPX file I started with had standard geocache treasure chests. The look like the chests when it uses the GPX file for Favorites, but POIs seem to turn into silver dots, not matter what is specified in the GPX. Might be the way a nuvi works.
Ok, my real life experience with waypoints on the nuvi, are posted here:
http://wi-geocaching.com/modules.php?name=Forums&file=viewtopic&p=57937#57937well I’ll be !!!!
you certainly seem to be right … based on what you quoted.
isn’t technology great !!!!P.S. … I got the unit in hand … but now it’s charging up and I think I might need to clear the snow out of the driveway … I will report back “real life experience” at a later date … maybe under a new topic … if a POI file can handle more than one category, I guess I can handle more than one topic.
Unless someone else disagrees, the short answer is “no”.
However, one “trick” would be to change the SYMBOLS for the waypoints that you do NOT want to delete to something you can remember. Then in the future, get in the habit of deleting “By Symbol Type” to steer clear of the ones you want to save.
A real life example … I always want to keep my OWN geocaches on my GPSr, so they all have the “pizza” symbol (don’t ask!) … while I let normal caches that I’m seeking to have the “geocache” symbol … then when I want to “clean house” and reload from MapSource, I highlight one of the geocache symbol-ed waypoints, and hit “Delete By Symbol Type”. This of course is useless, if you mess up and in error select “Delete All” instead.
@hogrod wrote:
I use the custom POI loader with my 60cx and since the custom POI file is on the card you can have different cards with different groups of caches but having multiple cards is unnecessary because there is a better way.
Yes a 60cx can handle multiple custom groupings … but the “unknown”, at least for me … can a Garmin Nuvi deal with multiple custom groupings. Not saying it doesn’t, since I’m still waiting for the UPS driver, but I’d be surprised if they’ve taken custom that far for a unit meant to sit in your car … I’m pretty sure it’s looking for a single file, with the name of “poi.gpi”.
@Cachew wrote:
I am extremely interested if you can successfully upload geocache waypoints (as we know them, and as they come from gc.com) without any fussing around. Also, please let us know if you can successfully upload your existing waypoint libraries. I know they claim that you can upload custom POI’s, but I have a feeling that the format is different. Thanks, Cachew
Looking through the online manual for a Nuvi (but again prior to actually having the unit in my hands), I see some promising looking things:
“Supported File Types” seems to include “Maps and Waypoints from MapSource” (Page 20, Nuvi 650 manual).
Also it looks like you can mass delete all your “Custom Points of Interest”, by plugging it into your computer and opening the “Garmin/POI” folder on the nuvi Drive or SD card and deleting poi.gpi file” … it also implies the use of either the built-in drive space or an SD card … so I assume if you for example load a bunch of cache locates as custom POI’s on an SD card, that pulling the card would magically make the caches go away, or for that matter allow multiple “groups” of caches by using multiple SD cards.
Someone mentioned they could find manuals on line … they are right on the Garmin website … here’s an example for getting to the Nuvi 650 manual …
1. goto garmin.com
2. select [On the Road] >>> [Automotive]
3. click on the PICTURE of the [Nuvi 650]
4. in the upper-right corner under “Quick Links” click on [Manuals]
5. click on [Download] behind “Owner’s Manual”Also, from playing with a similar model in the store … you can directly type in coordinates … you are NOT limited to marking a spot you’ve visited … if you have coordinates on a piece of paper, you can punch those in as a waypoint.
Also, from what I’ve read, you can use the free “POI Loader” software to load in a .GPX file … but since I don’t have the unit yet, I’m not sure who simple it is to do.
I will experiment with all these things, once I have the unit. I had not planned on actually taking the unit out in the field, but had figured I’d punch in parking coordinates. My feeling is that once I’m out of the car and in the woods, what use is auto-routing and cool features; all I need to know is what the distance and direction is, beyond that it’s all about finding your own path to take.
Near as I can tell from Garmin’s site the free POI Loader (which I’ve already download) IS suppose to work with the Nuvi units.
I got one of those too … I thought it was a pen and pencil holder, I was going to take it to work.
CLOSURE …
Decide to go with the in-car equipment for now (maybe add a handheld at some future point) … went with the Garmin Nuvi 650 … turns out that via the Costco.Com website (not in the store), you can get one for $299 (due to an instant $150 off coupon), which seems to be an amazing price for the unit. So we’re waiting for the UPS man now.
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