GPS Kids | Ask Garmin: Just how durable are Garmin’s outdoor handhelds?

In the 20 years that we’ve been building rugged gps kids watch devices, they’ve survived explosions in Iraq, snowbanks in Michigan winters and sharp teeth in a bear’s mouth. In a less extreme situation – and one that might hit closer to home – Dario Sartori sent us a testimonial earlier this month to share with anyone wondering about Garmin’s legendary reputation for durability.

This past May I took part in a dualsport ride from Stoneyford, CA to Ft. Bragg, Ca. I rode with a group of friends and I had a Garmin Legend HCx on my bike. Part of the ride went through some tight singletrack. Partway in the singletrack one of my buddies who was on a KLR650 had his engine seize up on him.

About 2 miles farther on the trail I tipped over my bike and landed on a bush. I got back on however when I arrived at the end of the trail roughly 2 miles later I noticed that I had lost my gps kids watch unit on the fall. I chose not to retrieve it as the ride had over 500 riders, a lot of whom were coming down the same trail, so to go back would be dangerous as I would be going against the flow of traffic.

Two weeks ago I convinced a friend to go back with me to where I thought the unit was. We failed to find the entrance to the singletrack. So I called the owner of the KLR as he had a Garmin nuvi 500 on that fateful day and he was able to give me the coordinates of where his bike had died. I then proceeded to input these coordinates into my new gps kids watch, a Garmin gps kids watchmap 60Cx. With that and mapsource I was able to figure out where I needed to go, made a waypoint in mapsource and uploaded it to my 60cx. Myself and 2 others went back today, 3 months after the loss of the gps kids watch, and I was able to find it. Believe it or not it was there and it actually started up, not for too long as the batteries were drained, but with new batteries it works fine!!!!

Thanks, Dario, for the great letter. Anyone with great Garmin adventures to share should send us an email, and you just might see your story on the Garmin blog.

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