If I knew where bloody east was...

[villainousbroodmare]

Is there anything more annoying than hearing the disembodied satnav voice instruct "Head east!" in a sprightly tone? For fuck's sake, if I knew which way east was at this moment, do you think I would be consulting a sat nav?

And worse, when it takes a moment, evidently decides it's talking nonsense and amends it to "Head north!" or "Make a U turn!"

As ye were...

I love my satnav (although the one that is fitted to the car is useless - doesn't give enough notice at junctions etc).

I have used several and never had one tell me to go east, they always say turn left, or follow the B862 etc. Mine does have compass on it though, so could work it out if necessary.

I tend to ignore mine for the bits I knw, and just use it for the complicated bits at the beginning/end of journeys in strange places.

THe best thing is that it doesn't matter how wrong/lost I get, I can just press the Home button and I get there eventually.

Yes to fiddlesticks. Worse was when you couldn't find the road and parked up for 10 minutes searching the whole page before giving up and driving around.

You all have a different make sat nav to me, obviously! Mine doesn't tell me to head towards a compass point. It's a five year old Tom Tom, not the top of the range, but did come with free updates, and it has always got me to the right place!

In the early days of portable navigation devices, I was once instructed to make a ninety-degree turn off the M25 flyover onto the M4 that was passing beneath it at that point.

I think the crash barrier would have prevented this, had I tried.

While it's easy to come up with stories of satnav disaster, I use Google navigation for all journeys, even to the local supermarket on a Saturday morning. An accident or road closure that causes gridlock can happen at any time, you need traffic information.

I once ignored sat-nav unusual instructions for coming home from a DD swimming lesson 15 minutes from home on a Sunday morning, result of going the usual/obvious route, two hours stuck in traffic, as a result of some event closing lots of roads.

My city has a hellish one way loop system. At one point the sat nav says something like "turn slightly left, then a bit sort of right and head to the central lane". WTF?

81 I have always had TomToms too - much easier to follow!

I love my SatNav's attempt at pronouncing Polish place names when we drive there. Łódź comes out as 'Lodzee' rather than 'Woodge', Warszawa as 'Warzeeawa' (should be 'Varshava') and don't even get me started on Wrocław (should be 'Vrotswav).

By the way, if your Satnav, is taking you down narrow unsuitable roads and through fords etc, when you know it should be going for motorways, it's worth switching it from 'shortest route' to 'fastest route'. Took me a while to get that!

Back in the 70's you could get a printed itinerary from the AA; it was a notepad with directions-you just flipped the pages as you got to a section; and could reverse it to come home.

I remember those days, but they just didn't work if you're driving on your own. You can hardly stop in the middle of a motorway to check where you are.

Many of the issues raised on here are simply the product of failing to update your Satnav. If it doesn't recognise a bridge or thinks you're driving across fields, chances are that spending 5 minutes plugging it into your computer will remedy that.

Other difficulties seem to be caused by not using the Satnav together with the map and display. It won't come as a surprise when it tells you to turn left if you've noted that the display shows the diminishing distance to the turn-off point.

I love the Satnav for the peace of mind it gives me. Previously I was always worrying about things like whether I'd missed my turn-off and spent ages rechecking the maps if I went wrong or if I couldn't use a planned route because of roadworks or similar. Now a quick glance shows me where my turn-off is, and I know that if I go wrong it'll get me back on track relatively easily. And, fortunately, it doesn't tell me to go East or West, it just gives directions in terms of right and left.

On holiday in US our satnav kept changing voice. The dc gave them names Satnav Sally, (we were obeying her instructions and going right way) Shouty Sue (missed a turn, make a u-turn NOW) and Sarky Sandra (when we were ignoring her completely "would you like me to re-route? Re-routing now)

I hate satnavs & don’t use one. I find them
bloody irritating with their constant squawking, and I really dislike the over-reliance people have on them - they seem to stifle independent thought & reasoning.

I just look at a map before I leave, and if it’s a particularly complex journey, write myself some bullet point directions.

I'm with babdoc, much easier to plot a route and follow it. Also you then have some idea where you are going.

A particular joy is driving over the new Forth Bridge. Madam satnav doesn’t know it exists, and panics as she shows me apparently hovering over deep water, then driving through roadless ploughed fields!

Fun, isn’t it. Mine has the addition of traffic. I know, but it doesn’t, that just because right now, at 4.50 pm, heading out on the A71 is the quickest route, in ten minutes when I get there, it will be gridlocked for half an hour.

And often “you want me to turn right, at that junction, at this time of night?!!”

But for the most part, my sat nav has taken me where I need to go, along decent routes. I drive to lots of new places, by myself so map reading isn’t possible. The only time I ever got messed up was when I checked the route before hand, ignored the SatNav and ended up on the wrong side of Liverpool. Took me an hour to sort it out.

write myself some bullet point directions.

And read them whilst driving?

The funny pronunciations and mooing when it thinks I’m speeding make mine totally worth it on a boring journey 🐮

The sat nav in my car tells me to 'turn half' ie ' turn half left'. 🙄

Many of the issues raised on here are simply the product of failing to update your Satnav. If it doesn't recognise a bridge or thinks you're driving across fields, chances are that spending 5 minutes plugging it into your computer will remedy that.

Depends on timing. Our house is 5 and a half years old. I got a new car with updated satnav maps last year, out road still isn’t on it. Neither is the new Forth Crossing.

The funny pronunciations and mooing when it thinks I’m speeding

Mine used to moo when there was a speed camera.

One one journey on the M74, I saw a herd of cows going along a bridge over the road (something I’d never seen before). With impeccable timing, my sat nav said moooooo.

I giggled 😄

Mine is delayed. When it tells me be in the right lane - just as well I'd already looked at the route and knew where I was going or id of been in the left lane.

I hate satnav because of its inability to be up to date with things like roadworks, or even recent changes like the new parking in our neighborhood which has cause our street, which used to be the only two way street, becoming a one way street.

I use an app (WAZE) which allows drivers to make notes of changes like this and transient things like an accident or roadworks.

when i used to use the work van that satnav was completely crazy....you couldn't just put in the postcode, you had to go all through the address, hopeless in the wilds of Scotland trying to find a named cottage.
Also she did weird stuff at roundabouts, sometimes she would count the road you were on as the first exit, so she'd say take the second exit, meaning the first turn off, whereas normally the second exit is the next one. But totally inconsistent, so you really needed to have your wits about you to her shenanigans .

I use Google maps and have said the same thing. Best was in Saltburn recently, when there was very heavy fog and it kept telling me to head down a road that didn't seem to exist

To be fair, Wrynose Pass is a real road! I have to drive over it every day so not Sat Nav's fault.

East is to the right of West. Simples!

We use ours in France, too, and the pronunciations are hilarious, not to mention completely unintelligible.

What does annoy me (pedant alert) is that it invariably says, 'Keep right/left on to XYZ road, instead of on. On to is when you're turning on to it FGS.

Dh adores the SatNav but it's let us down more than once so I won't go anywhere without a road map in the car - usually having worked out the route in advance, if it's new to us.

Pre satnav, dh used to have a fantastic sense of direction, miles better than mine (though I'm a very good map reader) but after relying on car or phone satnav for years now, I swear it's nothing like it used to be. Use it or lose it....

Some 13 years ago, so before the era of smart phones and sat nav in every pocket my now DH and myself were on holiday in the UK.
I was driving on the motorway (few days in and already comfortable driving the other side of the road) when our sat nav said: "Leave the motorway!".
My immediate chain of thought was: first I resisted the immediate urge to pull over. Then I thought: what? Now? Where? why? is there something ahead of us, but it's sat nav, how can it know? (it was before the sat nav contained traffic data). I was confused. Only after all this the sat nav continued: "... after 3 kilometers"