GPS
 

I bit the bullet and purchased a Garmin for our upcoming trip to France. Will the rental cars come equipped with a cigarette lighter for charging of my GPSS?

The Peugeot 207 we rented was pretty basic, but it had a cigarette lighter. The GPS was a Godsend! It really helped but we got used to her saying "recalculating" whenever we doubted her. She was almost always right.

jeffrey

GPS makes life a lot easier especially when driving in a foreign country with foreign street signs.

Most or nearly all rental cars will have cigarette lighter for charging purposes, so don't worry.

My question to you is did you have to buy extra software for European roads?

s

Swagman, I purchased the Garmin with the European software already built in. With the help of this forum, I learned that Garmins with a model # containing an odd middle # have European software in it already. i.e mine is a 270.

Thanks for the cigarete lighter info

I believe your GPS should come with a charger, our TomTom did. I bought the additional France software and found that having a GPS is an invaluable tool. Who wants to try to read road maps in the dark? I did print out some additional maps through ViaMichelin so I could program alternative routes. Combining the 2 proved a God send.

Enjoy!

Jeffery,

I did not know that our Garmin might already be loaded with European software. Our model # is 350. So, when we take it to France, is there anything we need to do to activate the European software - or does it just automatically pick up the signal and a person is "good to go"??

I don't have a garmin, but a Magellan. When we arrived and turned it on it took about 20 minutes to obtain a signal. Then I had to select France to bring up the correct map. It was a godsend.

You should know that in some European cars, there is something in the windshield glass that inhibits the GPS signal. Mine worked, but sometimes when turning it on it took a while to obtain a signal. If your Garmin comes with an external antenna for mounting outside the car, I would suggest getting it. You can read about our adventure with the GPS in our trip report here:

http://www.slowtrav.com/tr/tripreport.asp?tripid=1259

We used our Garmin Nuvi 670 in Germany and Austria last September.

I don't know what type of mount you plan to use, but my husband got a bean bag mount and it worked great. No sliding around and it was easy to put away whenever we stopped.

Make sure you check your cigarette lighter before you move the car. We were just in France and neglected to do so and sure enough, it didn't work. Stopped at the Hertz office in the next town but even though they agreed it was a blown fuse, couldn't fix it for several days. We ended up charging our Tom Tom at night for the next day. Lesson learned for us.

I rent cars in Europe quite often and always use the cigar lighter socket (phones, charger, etc). Virtually all cars have the socket - only the very basic Hyundais etc do not have it.

Peter