Originally Posted by
adamdegraff
I have a love hate relationship with my GPS. It does not help at all with overpasses. But I have come to terms with some of its quirks.
Here is my system. I always start by looking at the motor carriers road atlas. (Rand McNally... suggested to me by somebody on POG.) It has truck routs highlighted on it. So you can rest assured that all the highlighted routs are A-OK. So I basically stick to those routs. Then I consult on Yahoo Maps. The tink I like here, is you can drag and drop the route to different points, augment it, change it, etc. and it gives you feedback. Then, with my route basically decided, I plug it into by GPS. (Garmin 750, available at Sams club for $250 or $300.) It has a routing option. I think this is a necessity because with this option, you can bypass the "quickest" rout option that does lots of stupid stuff cuz it thinks it is faster. So I use the routing option to plug in points along the way that I see on the hard copy may.
The GPS gives me accurate timing, places to stop along the way, and verbal directions, so I can zone out and concentrate only on the chaos in my bus and the crazy drivers cutting me off.
Then in the rare case that you get off your route, you can stress about over passes, etc. By the way, I have my height written on a post it note right on my dash, so I can always check it against the low overpasses.
Good luck!
Adam