Overland Legends: Garmin

Garmin is nearly synonymous with navigation. For decades this innovative company as been producing the most user-friendly and capable navigation and GPS data devices available - not to mention their world-class paper maps. What makes Garmin tick, and why should you take a hard look at their products?

Paper maps are great for some things, but, like nearly all of us, I also use GPS navigation both to plan and guide my off-road trips. There are plenty of offline GPS navigation apps out there, and for the most part they work pretty well.

However, a standalone GPS navigation unit, like the Garmin Overlander, offers some big advantages over using a phone or tablet. The first is dedication of purpose. You ask many things of your smartphone - it's a true jack of all trades. But its small screen and low-power GPS receiver limit its usefulness as a navigation device. GPS navigation is also a drain on your phone's battery, leaving less juice for making calls or sending messages, and shortening the overall life of your phone's battery. Save your phone for Instagram.

 
Garmin's Overlander is one of the most sophisticated GPS units on the market today. This essential piece of overlanding gear is purpose-built from the circuit board up and is designed to withstand dust and extreme temperatures. It not only offers highly detailed and comprehensive topographical maps of both North and South America, but also the crowd-sourced travel apps iOverlander and Ultimate Public Campgrounds for an extra layer of information - no need for a cell signal.

64GB of additional internal storage means you can load up even finer-grained maps, like USGS quad sheets, or even satellite imagery. Its 7" full color touch screen is highly responsive and vivid even in direct sunlight, and it mounts securely to your dash with a powered magnetic mount or the included RAM 1" ball mount.

Besides Garmin's legendarily accurate spoken turn-by-turn directions, additional features include a barometer and altimeter, as well as a pitch and roll angle indicator. Plan your adventure ahead of time and record your tracks to share with friends with a laptop or your phone using Garmin's Explore app. It's high-power GPS receiver hunts down and holds fast satellite signals in even the most remote locations.

With all these features, the Overlander actually takes over many of the navigation functions you may regularly use on your phone besides just mapping. And its deeply detailed pre-loaded map data means you can search for the nearest inspiration point while you’re in the middle of nowhere.

For hopeless romantics still committed to paper maps, pairing the Overlander with Garmin's DeLorme line of atlases and gazeteers means you'll never have to wonder where you are, or where you're headed.

Get your Garmin Overlander device fast: shipping from our warehouse same day or next business day. Backed, of course, by Expedition Overland's trail tested guarantee and Overlander's one-year price guarantee.