I am not very skillful at navigating. Partially it's practice, partially it's over-reliance on GPS, partially it's being a woman.
![Laughing :lol:](./images/smilies/icon_lol.gif)
Trying to decide between the following options:
Assume that I 100% must have reliable phone access in case the shit hits the fan and I need to be at work immediately.
1. Bring phone + compass. Buy international SIM card; hope that the data charges for occasionally using google maps aren't crazy. Probably the cheapest option.
2. Bring phone + compass, use current SIM card. When I was in the Netherlands before I was able to spend 3 euro to get a few mb of data for 24 hours...I'm not entirely sure how I did it, because it all happened in Dutch. I don't know if I can repeat this in Belgium or France. Given the length of the trip this may be acceptable, but it's unreliable because I don't know whether I can buy data in places other than the Netherlands. Additionally, the ability of my phone to find bike paths/roads using Navmii (a data-lite navigation app) is approx. zero. Though I can find highways! And I can look at a detailed road map without data/wi-fi, as long as I've already downloaded the whole country previously.
2.5. Bring phone + compass...ask for directions and hope for the best.
3. Buy/borrow/steal some kind of GPS bike computer that has actual maps. I'm NOT happy about how much these cost.
4. Buy/borrow/steal some kind of hiking GPS. These cost more or less the same as the bike computer, but may be more versatile and less battery demanding. And the maps to download for them are sometimes as expensive as the GPS itself. And also not bike-friendly, necessarily.
5. Bring paper maps. Most low-tech option. Not necessarily the cheapest. The weight for multiple countries is probably not ideal.
6. Buy/borrow/steal a car GPS. Hope I can charge it with a camping solar panel or a hub dynamo. I don't currently own a hub dynamo. The weight's not ideal. The battery is not ideal. The non-bike specific maps are not ideal. The price is pretty good.
If I had more time, I'd care less about getting to my destination and navigation wouldn't be as big a deal...but I pretty much need to know exactly where I am throughout the duration of this trip.
Anybody have any additional suggestions or commentary on the options above? Anybody willing to sell me an old Garmin bike computer with maps?