Garmin Birdseye to yield satellite images

This article was originally published on Cache Up NB. It has been mirrored here for archive purposes only.

I was looking to obtain some new maps for my Garmin GPS when I stumbled upon this. Apparently Garmin is going after something Delorme has had for awhile: the ability to put satellite images/maps on your Garmin GPS unit. For $30/yr, you apparently have unlimited access to satellite images that can be transferred directly to a supported Garmin GPS unit. This would allow you to have a “birds eye view” of the area you are in.

Now with Delorme, they have been restricted to maps of the US, but when I did a search on Google for BirdsEye in Canada, I found this link on GPS City for the pre-sale of BirdsEye cards for Canada. That would seem to imply that this will be available for folks within Canada.

It looks like this service will only be compatible with Garmin Colorado, Oregon, and Dakota GPS units so if this is something you are interested in, it might be worth the money to upgrade in the near future. Now, I know that the Google maps for parts of New Brunswick are awful, but for $30 it really is not that bad of a deal to at least take a look at it. The idea that I could use satellite maps when caching in rural areas is very appealing.

The maps apparently work with a new piece of Garmin software called Basecamp which I tried today. It looks very similar to MapSource but seems to integrate a bit better with your actual GPS units. I’ll be playing with it a bit to see what it really can do.

Garmin’s website indicates that BirdsEye is supposed to be available in March but GPS City has an estimated in stock date of April 21st.

I will keep you posted as I learn more.