Pilot to navigator …

Trading beloved maps for an electronic wayfinder

Old Man Winter’s grip is as tight as ever. With early March temperatures in the single digits, the bike is forced to hide in the garage and leave the rider with a building, coltish frustration — way past ready to ride, yet still unwilling to freeze.

Two weekend short trips have been canceled so far due to the spotty forecasting by the Government’s meteorologists who have promised sunny Saturdays and Sundays but have delivered only overcast skies, cold, and snowy roads. It’s got to be a conspiracy concocted by those sadists at the National Weather Service and car-driving motorbike-haters everywhere.

Beset on all sides by black ice all that’s left to do is thumb through motorbiking catalogs and ponder the irresponsibility of spending money on gadgets that are advertised as essential to the Adventure Touring Experience.

The gaze lingers on the pages of electronic navigation devices.

While considering what kind of Global Positioning Satellite based device might work best and not lighten the treasury too much, a lightning bolt of luck strikes. While discussing all things motorized with a friend he explains that he’s stopped having fun on his GoldWing and so has sold it. But he’s kept his rarely used, barely one-year-old Garmin 550 – The Gold Standard of GPS devices made specifically for motorbikes. And, he wonders if you’d like to pick it up, for say, far less than half of retail.

After a day of audition, the Garmin 550 changes ownership. It’s a solidly built unit that comes with a variety of easy wiring options — though wiring it yourself is apparently a violation of the warranty — it does not require a relay if wired directly to a 12 volt system. It has a sturdy mounting bracket that is able to twist itself into an almost infinite number of Cirque du Soleil worthy positions, and locks down tightly, so an aftermarket bracket is not needed.

The bracket attaches pretty easily to the small inverted u-shape bar that partially supports the instrument panel of the R1200GS. Using a standard 2 inch u-bolt and an inch-long piece of hard-rubber ¾ inch sprinkler tubing, the bracket holds remarkably tight and displays almost zero vibration at speed. It looks right at home perched aside the instrument cluster.

The Garmin has a large, bright touch screen that has easy-to-read maps, buttons big enough to be seen, and navigating its menu is accomplished even wearing the heaviest gloves. It’ll calculate any route you’d like to take and provide you with more data about your trip than you’ll ever want to know.

Even though GPS devices have been around for more than a decade, and are commonplace in most cars today, having one for the bike feels like a decadent luxury item. And, for a monthly service fee it’ll even report the most current weather forecast. Fat lot of good that’ll do you.