Happy with my 5x

I know it isn't something that you see on this forum very often, but I just got back from a quick 3 day backpacking trip to the Pecos Wilderness here in New Mexico and I am very happy with how the watch functioned while navigating, following a preset course from base camp, and getting us back to camp in a horrible rain/hail storm with limited visibility. The wrist HRM could have been better at times but for any activity where I'm serious about recording HRM I'll use my HRM-Run.

Activities are here
https://connect.garmin.com/modern/activity/1996950060
https://connect.garmin.com/modern/activity/1996952235
https://connect.garmin.com/modern/activity/1996957797
https://connect.garmin.com/modern/activity/1996961100

Battery life was great, GPS was solid, and the ability to see my previous path and the map on the way back from our summit attempt on Truchas peak was key to getting us back to camp safely in conditions with extremely limited visibility. Overall I'm really happy with how this watch has performed and the map features, when used in the wild, were very useful.

0 Former Member over 7 years ago

Thanks for sharing. Did you create any routes on the watch while you were on your trip? Were the distance remaining field and elevation fields accurate?

Also curious to know more about your basecamp workflow as I'm planning a trip myself.

By the way, one issue I've noticed is the turn-by-turn on the watch on windy trails can be off and erroneous.

0 nmyeti over 7 years ago

I should mention that i have the Garmin 24k topo for this area. I created 3 routes in basecamp using that map. I created From Jack's Creek to Pecos Baldy Lake, from the lake to the summit of East Pecos Baldy, and from the lake to the spot where we drop off the main trail to summit Truchas.

Elevation was spot on once it calibrated at the lake. The calibration at the start of the trip was just a touch low and if i'd been thinking i would have entered a manual calibration as i know the elevation where we start. Everything from the lake on seemed about perfect or very close as the lake sits at 11,400 or so and we were camping just about it. The elevation gain listed on the first activity going from the trail head to the lake is probably spot on, just the absolute numbers are off from the poor initial GPS aided calibration when i started the activity.

Once i started a route, i just navigated until i joined the course. The only alerts I received was when i went off course. I didn't have "turn by turn" directions on the switchbacks as i've heard of others having as i suspect my maps knew that i was on the same trail.

The distance remaining on the main route navigation screen was spot on. I didn't check that other field that i've heard can be off/odd. I basically just flipped between the main data screen, HR, and the one with the map and distance remaining on the bottom. They were all excellent.

If you are doing a similar trip with an actual base camp. I highly recommend a good gravity filter. As you can see on the maps we were close to a good water source. My 4L MSR autoflow filter was awesome.

0 Former Member over 7 years ago

I?m really curious what the 24K maps look like in general. Would you please be able to share a few screenshots?

0 nmyeti over 7 years ago

For some reason the screenshot hotkey i setup will not let me take a shot of a zoomed in point on the map, but here are a few native screenshots showing the map and a few taken with my cell phone at other zoom levels.

Also this vbulletin software is being goofy and telling me that my .jpg files are "invalid" so here is a google photos link to the photos

https://photos.app.goo.gl/gPIlijkKd5pC4sIo1

I also added a few screenshots of the map as seen in Garmin basecamp.