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I'm doing the Great North Trail with a friend in a few months. I'm wondering whether getting a satellite messenger such as the Garmin In Reach mini is a good idea for emergencies and keeping in touch?
Is it something worth having, or would it be overkill?
Assuming you are riding together then I reckon you'll manage without. Might depend what network you are on though. Some are pretty shit in rural Scotland.
How recent is your phone? Latest iPhone and latest Google pixels - I'm pretty sure - have satellite Comms for emergency calls...not sure how they work, but that could be a solution.
Unfortunately not up to date enough to do that, and not old enough to justify a new one.
Assuming you are riding together then I reckon you'll manage without. Might depend what network you are on though. Some are pretty shit in rural Scotland.
Thanks.
Is vodafone still the best for rural scotland?
I don't think it is the best now, but it does work well... EE seems to be as good and stronger in a few places (similar to Vodafone).
Between the two of us, one is on EE, and one is on Vodaphone, so should be good.
EE is probably the best at the moment so you should be well covered.
FWIW I used to use a Spot tracker but 4G coverage has gotten so much better so the Spot is 99.9% redundant (I know, it'll be that 0.1% that'll kill me 😉)
EE is probably best for the Highlands, but reception is still iffy in many areas - I can go 5 km from home and there’s zero coverage. I use a Garmin Inreach Messenger - mainly for kayaking but also the occasional trip into the hills - the Map Share option means people can track you in real time/send SMS even where there’s no mobile reception. You can hire them for about £6/day. Between the Spot and the Inreach the Garmin has better tech/more reliable/less drop-outs