The family..

My photo
SouthEast, PA, United States
This Blog is all about me and my life as a mom of a beautiful 9 year old and my dear husband who entertains me as much as my girl does.

Sunday, July 13, 2008

On the road..and a GPS issue.

Our first day of our vacation was conveniently planned on our wedding anniversary. Through the last 11 years we have taken several vacations at this time of year. There are several good reasons for this. First off, we are commemorating the best vacation we ever had, our honeymoon. Second, it probably helps that since we were married June 28th, it falls right near a major holiday which then means less vacations days to use. This helps all around because I never have enough vacation days. That is my main reason for wanting to move to Spain (besides the mid day siestas), they take A LOT of vacation time. So after we spent a few hours trying to shove all of our belongings in the car including the child, we were off on our way to the beach.

The first step in our journey involved typing in our destination to the GPS system. This was a tool (toy) that DH wanted and received for his birthday. We have made the trip to Virginia Beach many times in the last 11 years but since we have the all knowing GPS we had to see what it would suggest. Now there are many options available when you choose a destinations. There is the fastest time, shortest distance, least highways, and most highways to choose from. Through the last several months we have become familiar with the shortfalls of the GPS and have learned to try all options before selecting one. This journey proved no differently and we had to choose the shortest distance option to get the main roads we wanted (Rt 13 NOT 95). As we set off all was going well until we hit traffic and attempted to use the detour function. This move confused the system and soon fighting erupted between the occupants of the front seat as DH become frustrated with not knowing where we were being directed to go and myself being angry at him for relying on a stupid computer when the friggin' signs were right in front of us. This fighting soon led to him pulling over and telling me to drive (nice anniversary right?). I was more then willing to drive as long as we could go the RIGHT way and soon we were on our way with me ignoring the stupid GPS system (did I mention it's STUPID). I think technology can be beneficial but I am a true believer in maps. Does the GPS have its good points, yes it does, as a backup system. I am of the opinion that you should only use it when you already have a mapped route in mind.

So after we were an hour away from Rt95 the GPS finally agreed that we were proceeding the right way and we had an uneventful drive to Atlantic Avenue. We found our hotel and checked in and went down to check out the pool. The main reason I picked this hotel was that it had 3 pools. Now Sweetpea is half fish and will swim for hours, so a pool is a vital asset on vacation. This hotel was special because it had a pool with an indoor lazy river. We all had a great time going down the water speedway and through the indoor waterfalls and we headed off to bed looking forward to our next few days on the beach.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I am also a firm believer in maps and have not yet purchased a GPS system. I came close to getting Honey a Garmin for Fathers Day but experience Memorial Day weekend changed my mind.

During our little getaway for the black tie wedding Honey and I were constantly getting phone calls from friends asking for directions or the find the local Wal*Mart. We were the only ones staying at a hotel with free wireless access and Google maps did a much better job than our friends' GPS systems.