I have the InReach, cheaper, because of the ability to go dormant in off season.
I've found the texting feature to be very useful in the wilds of BC and Alaska beyond phone service for spouse-reassurance or arranging logistics or rendezvous.
I have a cell plan which covers Canada and Mexico, but if you don't, you can save on roaming charges, at least for basic messages.
For the InReach guys, is there a specific model you would recommend?
Annual subscription or monthly?
Thanks everyone, we have always carried a sat phone with us... but I found the plans pretty expensive and the usage of the phone very minimal. In most cases we were just checking in with family or arranging to meet friends, so text messaging was adequate for our needs. So when I saw this on Amazon https://www.amazon.com/Garmin-Handh...R1Y82MZ177QA&refRID=2BN0263HR1Y82MZ177QA&th=1
It seemed to be another boat toy that may actually get used on occasion.
The original Spot was one way communication only, to an unreliable satellite constellation.
The original Spot was and is far better than the older Epirbs, I'll give a copy and paste from Wiki, notice the coverage of one satellite - 20 km.
"The first form of these beacons was the 121.500 MHz ELT, which was designed as an automatic locator beacon for crashed military aircraft. These beacons were first used in the 1950s by the U.S. military and were mandated for use on many types of commercial and general aviation aircraft beginning in the early 1970s.[3] The frequency and signal format used by the ELT beacons was not designed for satellite detection, which resulted in a system with poor location detection abilities and with long delays in detection of activated beacons. The satellite detection network was built after the ELT beacons were already in general use, with the first satellite not being launched until 1982, and even then, the satellites only provided detection, with location accuracy being roughly 20 km.[3] The technology was later expanded to cover use on vessels at sea (EPIRB), individual persons (PLB and, starting in 2016, MSLD).[citation needed] All have migrated from using 121.500 MHz as their primary frequency to using 406 MHz, which was designed for satellite detection and location."
We had the original SPOT and used it for several years to populate a position page on our blog. Was super easy to just push the button once we were anchored each day, and our position would show up on the map on our blog with no further actions on our part.
Bringing our boat north from Seattle in November, the person accompanying me had an In-Reach, and I liked the ability to text my wife every couple days to say we were OK.
Anyone using an In-Reach to populate a position page on line? Just wondering if it is as easy to send the info using it, as it was for the SPOT?
Now here's an InReach killer app...Birdseye Satellite Imagery downloaded onto your device:
https://www.thegpsstore.com/Garmin-BirdsEye-Satellite-Imagery-Card-P2330.aspx
Imagine...working your way across an outer coast BC island with no trails but you know where all the little lakes are, so you can avoid them, or, you're on a mountain ridge and the clouds have moved in...is this the rock slide that goes over a cliff or is it the one with the awesome talus boot skiing run back to the meadow?
Yup it’s very easy. In fact, you don’t have to push a button - it can be set to do it every X minutes automatically which is what I use.
https://seabits.com/where/
Nice. Looks like you took a little boat ride to visit all my friends at their temporary home on McNeil.
Interesting
No comment re: Iridium Go
https://www.predictwind.com/iridium...B6Mgg8f2o8qoatgLbzrZL5MOpYzoCcWAaAlAmEALw_wcB
Any research I have done suggests it is superior to the alternatives.
Interesting
No comment re: Iridium Go
https://www.predictwind.com/iridium...B6Mgg8f2o8qoatgLbzrZL5MOpYzoCcWAaAlAmEALw_wcB
Any research I have done suggests it is superior to the alternatives.
It also is waaaaaay more expensive and primarily targeted at people very far offshore using it for grabbing weather data. $60/month for 5 minutes of data, and texts are charged at $0.25/text. The next tier up is $105 and includes free texts and more stuff, but that's quite a bit more expensive.
Iridium's tracker function is also more complex and less frequent. You have to turn it on with their software, and it uses your SMS quota to send them out every hour (highest frequency from what I remember during my testing) so you really need the $105/month plan to make it work.
Spot and inReach are much cheaper monthly, and inReach offers a way to turn their plans off for months throughout the year if you're not cruising. I think I pay $20-30 a month for my inReach plan and get something like 100-200 texts a month as part of that, plus unlimited tracking.
Based on one the OP was looking for in terms of text messages and tracking, the Iridium Go doesn't seem like a perfect fit....