So in this episode, we're going to be talking about Sat Nav stories. And so it's only right that our first guest is Glenn, one of our friends, who actually this was his idea for a podcast episode, wasn't it? It was. It was. And. Obviously we've, the story we have and it's quite funny. Yeah. so it's Glen over to you. Tell us.

Well, firstly, thanks for inviting me on and giving me the opportunity to share a couple, a couple of my experiences, a couple, yeah, so I've not driven down a guided bus wave yet, I have put in an incorrect postcode and ended up in the middle of an industrial estate. But I would like to share a couple of incidents. One very recently whilst I was having a weekend away in Nottingham. The other one several years ago back in Cornwall. So firstly my incident in Nottingham. So as a driver there is so much to observe when driving in a major city. In addition to operating the vehicle itself, increased traffic, volume of pedestrians, busways. One way streets, increased volume of traffic signs. They have trams in Nottingham as well. And the weather, the weather was appalling when we went. But with the help of Sat Nav we managed to locate the hotel and the multi storey car park relatively easy. Only for me to take the wrong turn, ending up in what appeared to be the service entrance for one of the mainstream shops. Where the security guard in his high vis jacket helped me reverse out back into the main road and redirect me into the next correct turning. In the sat nav's defence, it was probably driver error. There was a car blocking the correct entrance and when I mounted the kerb, I had a feeling this couldn't be the right way. But still have the cheek to pull the window down and ask, was this the multi storey car park? I guess the lessons learnt here was just being extra vigilant, although sat navs appear to have pinpoint accuracy, you as a driver will still need to take responsibility. I don't know if that's a, a starter,

that's a very honest one. That is. I quite, I quite like that being very honest because I think most people would. And say, is this it? And just drive down it anyway and then get onto a loading bay or something like that. It's like, this is a strange hotel, but

Yeah,

you did well.

Yeah, it's obviously nervy, okay, I would like to think I'm quite an experienced driver, but when you're in a city center, there's so much happening. You can't always blame it on the sat nav. So in this instance, I'll put it down to driver error. And yes, I'll hold my hand up.

Well, I'm here gonna say, yes, Nottingham City Centre. I've got lost as well. So it's not the easiest city centres. It's not the most straightforward and Luke and I got lost when we were trying to find a hotel and we ended up going round a couple of times and yeah, we had a few incidents that time. So yeah, I'm with you on Nottingham, definitely. But you mentioned loads of things there like loads more signs, the weather. And that all comes into play, doesn't it? Did you find that SatNav was just like added to the pressure as well?

It does. If you're rigid and follow the sat nav to everything it tells you to do, you could make a lot of mistakes. You have to take into consideration everything else that's going on.

I think that's the problem isn't it? Yeah, that is the problem. And that comes out as a theme through some of these stories actually, that yeah, SatNav's brilliant, but it is really important to go a bit old school at the same time. Yeah, definitely. So, you said you've got another story, Clare?

This was many years ago.

Ha

when, when, when Sat Navs first come out? I guess like many married couples, uh, you have your differences in relationship. We had heated discussions in the car, but they only, they only appeared to take place while I was driving and frequently due to me taking the wrong turns. I must admit, I'm not one for stopping and asking directions. so before sat navs were installed as a standard product in cars or available as a guidance on modern day phones, we took the option to purchase a bolt on system. Overnight it seemed to stop any directional discussions. There was no need for us to challenge ourselves on, is it the left? Is it the next right? Or have I took the wrong turn? It gave an accurate time we would reach the end destination, which at the time was cutting technology. Driving became more enjoyable. There was no need to plan the journey. You just got in the car and drove. Our only heated discussion were when we ganged up on the sat nav for not taking the easiest of routes. Or on one occasion when we ended up on an industrial estate, which I previously mentioned. Both occasions, it was probably down to me for not downloading the latest software or plugging in the correct destinations. Anyway, so our most memorable sat nav incident was on a journey through Cornwall. The weather was good, the end destination was set, we were heading through the countryside following the directions. With minimal fuss, admire the beautiful scenic views of the narrow winding roads. Turn right and take the second exit. Keep to the right and take the next left. The voiceover was concise and clear. We opted for the relaxed, calm, in control female voice, rather than the John Cleese option, which was available. So now take the second right and turn left. Now take the ferry. At this point we looked at each other and both repeated the phrase. Now take the ferry. Not knowing Cornwall that well, straight away I had visions of ending up in France in four hours time. At this point, I was panicking. The road was clear ahead. I thought I would turn around at the next safe place. As we navigated the bend, I joined the flow of traffic awaiting to board the ferry. There was around 20 vehicles in front of me. I was always told to look for a Plan B when you are driving and be aware of your surroundings. In the vent, you have to make an unexpected sudden movement in a safe, controlled manner. So today was no exception. I could see the hatched area was empty. In front of me, there was no oncoming traffic. My plan was to overtake the stationary vehicles in a safe manner. Get to the hatched area, turn around, and find another way to my destination. I pulled out, made my way down to the hatched area. As I overtook the vehicles queuing, I could see a major fault in my plan. ferry had arrived. The gates were opening, allowing the cars to embark. I made it to the hatched area but was stuck. I couldn't turn around. I had no option other than to get on the ferry. What made it worse is not only had I jumped the traffic queue, making my way to the front, I still didn't have a clue where I was going. Luckily it was just a short ride across the estuary. We got a few strange looks whilst on board but nothing serious. I guess the lesson learned is to be aware of your surroundings, your route, and always take note of the relevant road signs on your journey.

I just, when you first told me that I just had visions of you ended up in France. My favorite bit is the fact that you were planning to turn around, but ended up. You jump in everybody.

Yeah, I certainly did. I overtook everyone. Q jumped. And then when we got to the bottom, I couldn't turn around, so I had to get on the ferry. Uh, I was first on the ferry. We had the best view, but it was only cutting across Cornwall. Uh, it was my first time in Cornwall, I think.

I think that the message there is just listen to Sharon when you're driving. I think that's, you know, just

I can't comment. Yeah, I can't comment. Yeah, so

And of course, this was the early days of sat navs, so they were renowned, weren't they? They weren't good, were they? They were renowned for taking people off in all sorts of weird and wonderful directions. But yeah, probably not taking someone onto a ferry, but that was just a, it was a great story. Yeah, that's brilliant, lovely. So how do you use sat navs now though, Glenn? Now you've had all these, these experiences, are you more confident with them? And where they're actually going to take you, or? So I think the other thing, the

I'm stuck when I'm playing cricket and we've got a game in Milton Keynes and the sat nav in my wife's car doesn't work correctly. Well, it doesn't work at all. So I'm normally fine for being late, even though I've played there two or three weeks before. So, so if we don't turn up on time that they're, they're quick enough to find you. And I must admit, I don't like driving in Milton Keynes without the aid of Satnav,

nav on a regular occasion, so don't let it put you off is, um, is another message there, isn't it? Love

I would certainly be lost without it now.

Brilliant. Thank you very much for sharing your story. Yeah, it was good.

You are welcome and thanks for letting me, come onto your show.

And thank you for the idea as well.

So next we're gonna talk to Kirsty. So, Kirsty, I'm just gonna hand straight over to you to say who you are, what you do, and to tell us your story.

Hi, I'm Kirsty. I'm a travel blogger, and I write a website called Lost in Landmarks. So I do all sorts of travel all over the place but mostly I chat about travel around Britain on that podcast, although I do have another one that is a bit more driving. focused, which is about driving along Route 66, which is called Lost on 66, so

Oh, fantastic.

Yeah, so there's, there is lots, there's lots of uh, lost going on here, which is probably quite appropriate for our SatNav story. So, but yeah, so our funny story with the SatNav is so I'm going back a little bit now But it was when we were traveling in a camper van with our kids and it was quite a large camper van It was some quite wide quite old very very beige camper van We were traveling around France and in France there are some wonderful wonderful villages that accept camper vans and they have like car parks that are set up for campervans to stay overnight and things like that. They're called an air. Um, and we used to have this book that would have lists and lists of all these airs that we could go to in the, in the most obscure little French villages. and they would have the GPS coordinates that we would then plot into our sat nav. And so I did that with this one village that we were going to. And I was just absolutely convinced everything was fine. Absolutely fine. So we're driving along. It wasn't me that was driving. It was my husband, but, he's a truck driver, so he's a lot more better with bigger trucks than I am. And so we're driving along and we're just going down this small village road. And he's like, I'm not sure this is quite right. Are you sure this is right? And I'm like, yeah, because. The end site's just at the end of this road. It's fine. And as we're going down, the road's getting narrower and narrower and narrower. And people start to come out of the streets and sort of look at us and go, What are they doing down here? What are they doing down here? Are they supposed to be coming down here? And we get to the end of the road. The car park is just supposed to be in front of us, but unfortunately there is a large river there, and we can't get into the car park from that way, so, yeah, I had kind of set it up in a way and, like, led my husband down this road, and then he had to, unfortunately, reverse all the way back through this very, very narrow French village, so we

Which can't be very easy in a campervan.

No, and this is what I was saying, he's a truck driver, so he's kind of a little bit... He's a little bit more better than I am, like, you know, I'm used to using your middle mirror, but obviously with the campervan, you can't see anything through the back, so you've just got to use your side mirrors, and he's kind of good with that, so, but he still talks about it now as that I've let him down. into a river in France. So clearly

you, Kirsty. It was the sat nav. I don't,

it's that thing, you think this, you put it into the sat nav and you think, oh well that's fine, the sat nav says it's fine, so you go off, off you go, all confident, all confident to drive down. And um, yeah, so I'd, I'd love to say that that's the only time that that's happened, but I do that quite often,

I think you mentioned Cornwall as well, didn't you? When I, when I first got in touch with you, you

yeah, so I live in Cornwall now, clearly from my accent, I'm not from Cornwall, Yeah, so we recently moved down to Cornwall and everybody always says never use your, your sat nav in Cornwall, um, and so I had this in my head. Yeah, we won't use the sat nav when we get to Cornwall and we'd come down just for a bit of a recce before we moved and we were desperate to go to the beach because we lived in a place that was nowhere near a beach and we were just desperate to go to the beach. So we popped it into the sat nav. Didn't think anything of it and then we're just traveling down these roads and it's as you sort of go along You're like, oh my goodness. Um, I'm not sure I should be here You know this this is like a like I'd look at the phone and it would come up with a village coming up. I'm like, oh it's fine, we're coming to a village and there'd be one house in that village. And I'm like, this isn't right, it doesn't feel right. And the road just started to get narrower and narrower and narrower. I was like, I'm not sure this is good. My husband just sits and drives and I'm just out there going, um, yeah, it's fine. We're fine. I'm sure it's all going to be good. And we got towards the end of, you know, we could see on the sat nav that the sea was coming up. We were like, oh, we must be getting there. So, but we were so high up, like we were nowhere near like a car park or anything. We were so high up and I was like, we're just going to end up. I had visions of us just coming out of the cliff somewhere and that's the end of the road. And so, yeah, and that was like last. A couple of years ago, it really was very, very recent and we do that a lot. Eventually it turned us around this very, very tight bend and we managed to find a, the car park where it took us to, but oh my goodness, it was the narrowest of roads. And I do tell myself always, never use the sat nav in Cornwall. I still do it sometimes.

Yeah,

normally goes wrong. But normally that's our, that's our funny stories. They're always me thinking I know where we're going and then sending us down some narrow road.

Have you got any words of advice, any wise words for our listeners when it comes to Sat navs?

Normally, I'm very good actually normally at just checking out sort of the last part of the journey. So I like to look on Google Maps. I'm quite a big sort of, I'm a planner and that makes me feel good if I know where I'm going to end up. So normally that's what I would do. I would check out where the end of the journey is on Google Maps and that normally helps me. And also if you're, um, you know, just having a good overview of the journey as well is always good. And then it can make you sort of realize, okay, that's a really narrow road I'm going to go down. That's probably not the best one. Let's go and find another one. Because sat nav really just, and especially in Cornwall, for anybody who ever comes and drives down here, they don't pay attention to the size of the roads. They just send you the quickest way,

Yep.

which, which isn't so good when there's a tractor coming the other way.

No. Oh, lovely. That's brilliant. Thank you so much for sharing your stories. And I love the fact that your blogs are all about getting lost for your travel blogs. I think that's because it just is, if you're going to go places, it's a normal part of life is getting lost. But actually that's half of the adventure, isn't it?

Yeah, it's the story, it's the adventure, and sometimes you have the best things that happen when you get lost, isn't it? So, it's all part of the adventure. You're

Oh, brilliant. Thank you so much, Kirsty. Okay. Thank

welcome.

So this time, I'm delighted to introduce Fenella, who's a member of one of the business groups that I'm in, and she volunteered her Sat Nav story for this episode as well. So, To you to introduce who you're a little bit about what you do, and then dive straight into your satin story

Hi, so thank you. Yes, my name is Mila Hamus, and I am a trainer of something called Neuro Linguistic Programming, Timeline Therapy and Hypnosis. So essentially I train coaches and leaders to get better results. NLP is the art of understanding how your mind works to make it work for you. So that's for them to get better results for themselves and for other people. What I also do though is I coach and I get people, uh, to get over their barriers and especially any type of fear, which includes PTSD and phobias. So funny enough, my um, my Sat Nav story did actually start from when I was up in Manchester attending a training, weekend from my old trainer. I lived down in the south. I'm up there in Manchester and I'm going to go to Sudden Coalfield, which is near Birmingham, north somewhere of Birmingham, and I'm driving, put the Sat Nav on to direct me down there, and then I suddenly realise it's going to take me through the M6 toll. Now, you don't have to go through the M6 toll, I know, when you're going down that way. And I'm thinking, well, I don't want to pay 6 just for the pleasure of going through a road with just a few... Cars on it. I'm happy to sit in the middle of the day on a main road. And, uh, so what I did was I came off the motorway and went sort of down the road a bit somewhere, somewhere near Birmingham. And thought, okay, well, I'll plug in the sat nav again to be able to go on another road. So I plugged in the sat nav and because I was a fair way out, I thought, well, it'll probably go another way. No, it took me back to the M six toll So I wasn't having any of that 'cause I did have a bit of time. Once again, I went off, uh, off the motorway, offered another turn off. I think I went in nearly into Birmingham that time and, uh, put the Satnav in again and, uh, thought, okay, well I'll have another go. And, uh, started off on my journey once again. And guess what? It was not going to let me go anywhere else except for through the, by the M6 toll. So by then, I just kind of really, I was getting really frustrated, had no idea because I didn't have an old map, a map in my, my car. And, um, so I had no idea how else to use it because I had it on my phone. When you get all confused like that, just my head sort of gets all frazzled and you can't think. So yes, I have to suck it up and go down through the M6 toll and pay the money. So yes, that was just so, so infuriating. And that's why I don't really like using the Sat Nav a lot of the time because it takes me ways that I don't actually want to go. And it's not the only time that that's happened. So that's essentially it forcing me to pay money.

Oh dear. And it is so frustrating, isn't it? Because when you know that there must be another way as well, of course there's another way. But, um, so what would you, if you were doing that journey now, what would you do before starting the journey?

I'd take a map.

Yeah,

Seriously, I'd take a map and I'd mark it out on the map because I wouldn't trust the phone. Because you know when they start and you plug it in and you've got an idea of where you're going to go. Because I don't really know how to use the sat nav very well or like putting pins in or things like that. So, you know, when you put it in, and then it starts telling you to go away, so you know you don't want to go anyway, it kind of winds you up, well, it winds me up anyway, when it's telling me to go places that I don't want to go, and it's not listening to me. It's one of those things, talking to machines.

yes, I know. And do you talk to your sat nav as

Oh, yes. Oh yes, I, I tell it to shut up, and then I go, no, I don't want to go that way, be quiet.

Yes,

It's hilarious

yes, yes. Because they do change course, don't they? If you go off in a different direction. But you need to know which way to go. To the, you know, for it to then change correctly I think. Yeah,

the first place. Absolutely, because this one, no way was it going to let me go anywhere except for the M6 toll.

it was on commission, obviously,

Yeah. It's a nice quiet road though.

Oh, those brilliant. Thank you. Fan vanilla. Oh, that's great. And the, yeah, these things, these are exactly the sort of things that can happen with satin ns, aren't they? Thank you for sharing your story.

You're very welcome.

We put out into a business group that I'm in, asking for funny SatNav stories. And one of the people who came forward with the story was Joe. Hi,

Hi, Tracy. How are you?

I'm great. Thank you. And thank you so much for joining me this afternoon. So, Joe, I'm going to hand over to you and ask you to say who you are and what you do, and then just go straight into your SatNav story.

Okay. Thanks for having me, Tracy. I'm Jo Mitchell Hill, and I am an ADHD therapeutic parenting coach. So I work with parents, who have ADHD themselves, or have children who have ADHD. And I work with them. Using therapeutic parenting strategies to help them create a more harmonious home environment, better, deeper relationships between them and the kids. I've been doing that for gosh, a good few years now. absolutely love it. And I've helped, you know, quite a few people along the way.

Brilliant

Thank you. So my driving story. Last year, my brother, got married in Croatia, his wife's Croatian, and, that time of year, you can only fly to certain airports, and then you have to drive to wherever you're going, which is fine, not a problem, because I like to drive, driving doesn't bother me. I'm Australian. I grew up in Australia. If you want to get anywhere, you have to drive. So driving doesn't bother me, but it was the first time in such a long time that. I'd done it solo. My husband had stayed at home. It was just literally myself and my daughter. Like I've driven, around the UK with her, but never sort of abroad. And it didn't, didn't really worry me in the slightest, if I'm honest with you, other than the fact that I suddenly realized when I got there that all the signs were in Croatian, because they would be, they wouldn't be in English. So not a problem. So we drove from Zagreb down to Rijeka, which was, you know, lovely, very straight road. It's a toll road. It's a straight road, not a problem. Everything great. We got there, super, stayed there for the week, had the wedding, and that was great. We had to go home. We sort of left a little bit later and we were driving in the evening, which was probably my first mistake because yeah, I probably the least confident driver. I think in the evening, I think as I've gotten older, I know you just get older and your eyesight goes, doesn't it? So I plugged the phone in for the sat nav. And of course it was just. It was talking to me, but it wasn't showing me anything. So I'm like, oh, that's really helpful. And bless my daughter, she was only eight at the time. And she was like my wing woman. And she's like, it's okay, mummy. She said, I'll hold the, the thing. And she's a very nervous car passenger. Cause she'd had a car accident on the way to school. And she'd been quite nervous. So this for her was a big thing. So anyway, so we're driving along and I thought this is fine. Once I get on the toll road. It's, it's a straight drive to Zagreb. It's like two hours or something. So it's a straight drive and it's not an issue. And we'd booked a hotel for that night because our flight was quite early in the morning, it's driving around, driving around. Remember where I have to get off and that's great. So I've gotten off and the sat nav kept saying to me, turn left here. And I'm like, but there's no road there and I'm thinking, okay, we'll drive around again. And of course, again, you know, all the, signs are in Croatian. And I'm thinking, I have no idea where I'm going. If I carry on on this road, what country am I going to end up in? I have no idea, you know, just that kind of thing. Suddenly, suddenly realized I felt really vulnerable, really, really vulnerable. We were kind of skirting around the airport. So we, we, we weren't far from where we were because the hotel we were staying, it was like five minutes from the airport. And I thought there's got to be a petrol station around here somewhere. Someone's gotta, you know, be able to help me. And I was trying to. Be a little bit jovial because my daughter was starting to freak out that she obviously picked up on the fact that I was sort of stressing a little bit and I was like, you know, singing songs, clapping my hands, being all like that. But I was inside. I was like thinking, Oh my God, what am I going to do? Because at some point on our drive back, this warning light had flashed up on the car again, all in all in Croatia. And so I had no idea what it said. I'm just going to just. And it was pelting hard with rain and it was dark. So I'm just thinking, Oh my God. So you can imagine. So. I found, I don't know, like an Aldi's or something. And there was a petrol station. So I've parked up, I've run in with her. And you know, you get that nervous energy. And I've said, can anybody tell me where this is? And they all sort of looked at me. The woman at the desk started speaking to me in Croatian. And I was just like, I have no idea what you're saying. And then the two young girls came out from, Right. The store cupboard. And they said, you're literally like five minutes away from this place. Go out, turn left. I'm thinking left and I can't find this left street. And I said, okay. I said, if you're telling me it's five minutes away, we shall never see each other again, because I'll be at the hotel. I said, but if I'm back in five, 10 minutes, I said, someone needs to help us. So, cause it's getting ridiculous now. And I was also conscious of the fact I hadn't filled the car up because it was a high cost, had to fill the car up. I still had like half a tank so I was fine. So I drove out, drove around this It was like a industrial state, I guess. And I just said to my daughter, No, can't find it. So I've driven back in. And at this point, I have to admit, I was really, really close to tears. Like, really close to tears. I thought, I don't know what to do. I actually was in that much of a panic. I'm usually a very level headed, very sort of laid back person. But at this point, I just thought, I don't know what to do. I'm starting to feel unsafe. Because it's nighttime and it's getting later. My daughter's now starting to panic and I'm not sure and everything in me. I'm a parenting coach. I say this to parents all the time. You know, we've got to be calm. We've got to be calm. Otherwise we join in the chaos. And I'm thinking I'm just joining in that chaos. We're just going to have like tantrums. So anyway, I went back in. And there was a woman paying for her fuel, and I said, someone needs to help me. Someone needs to show me where this hotel is. And the woman took, the details of where it was. And she said, my husband is outside in the car. said, we'll show you where it is. And I said, well, I thought I could have kissed her. She said, you are literally five minutes away. I'm like, yes, everybody tells me I'm five minutes away from this place. So she then got in her car and I said to her, I'll pay you. I'll give you money. She's like, don't be ridiculous. She said, just get in the car and follow us. So we got in the car, and I still wasn't calm at all, and I was just like, oh please, like then thinking, then thinking, because you know, we've all seen American horror stories and stuff haven't we? And going, oh yeah, this is, this is a really clever thing to do Jo, but again thinking, no. My whole experience in Croatia to this point, everyone has been lovely, everyone has been more than helpful, and they were brilliant, and they took us, I never would have found it, I don't know where this left turn was, but it was this kind of like dog leg turn and then around

Um,

a suburban thing. And they, they sort of stopped in the hotel was there. So, I was ever so grateful ran out gave her a big hug said thank you so much that's amazing. They drove off and we went into the hotel, and I am. I spoke to the lady. the manager of the hotel. And I said to her, look, I've got a hire car. I said, but actually I'm so nervous and anxious now. I don't want to drive to the airport tomorrow. I said, but I've got this hire car. I need to get it back to them. Some lights flashed up. And at that point she just went, no. No. And I was like, now I grew up, my dad's family are Polish. So I knew, I knew what was coming. She's like, no, she said, you pay for nothing. She said, you leave this car here. She said, and I will make them take it back. She said, and you will pay for nothing. There will be nothing. There will be no money taken out of your account. They've given you a bad car, right? And she was like, Oh my. And I was like, Oh my God. Oh, I could kiss you as well. So she said to me, I will get you. a taxi for free. And I was like, Oh my God, this is just the loveliest country in the world. She said, it is literally five minutes. There's that five minutes again. She said, it's literally five minutes away, the airport. And I said, look, we have to be there so early. I would much rather someone pick us up and take us then have to worry about it. So they'd organized this taxi for us like the following morning for free and everything. And she said to me, don't worry about the car. Just leave everything here that needs to go back with it. So don't worry about the fact that you haven't put fuel in it. Don't worry about it. Anything like that. She said, you will not be charged. And she was true to word because here we are. A year later, no one's ever charged me for it. No one's ever contacted me about it. So she was, I don't know. She, she was obviously very scary to them and told them off. But I have to say it was the most. Someone must have been smiling at me because we got to that point where I just thought I didn't know what I'm going to do. If I keep driving, not sure what country I'm going to end up in. Um, and yeah, and we had these like little, these angels that came and saved us. So, I guess, you know, check your SatNav is working. That's probably a good thing to do. Um, and when you're going, you know, in a foreign country and maybe make sure that, that you can get things in English if, if at all possible. So you know where you're going and what you're doing. But yeah, it hasn't, I say it hasn't dampened my spirits to drive. I, you know, I still like to drive and I still drive anyway, but there is that little bit of nervousness in me in the, in the back of my mind, I'm just a bit like, Oh, do I really want to do this? But I keep going, keep going, keep putting that sat nav in and hope. And I've got a friend of mine gave me a, not that I think it works. Um, in Europe, but a friend of mine gave me another sat nav to download. And she said, this one's brilliant. She said, this one tells you if there's any problems and it diverts you then around. I'm like, it's amazing. So, so yeah. So I use that one now.

brilliant. Oh, so really it sounds as if the moral of the story for you is that being better prepared, that idea of actually, rather than just winging it because you feel confident, is regardless of how confident you feel, to have a look, do your research, know where you

absolutely. but I think also as well, because everyone was just saying to me, Oh, you know how to get back there. What I didn't think of was what I do at the other end.

Yeah,

And yeah, don't don't go in the dark. Go during the

yeah. So during the daytime when you feel better, but also that thing that people are willing to help as well, aren't they? When you ask for help. So I think anything like that, finding a shop, finding a petrol station, certainly I've done that when I've got lost in Wales. I, um, I just realised, hmm, this village was not on my list of villages I was supposed to be going through, I've taken a wrong turn. And so that's what I did. I

Yeah, yeah. And, and I think for my daughter, it was a good... exercise of like, I guess, modeling to her of like, you know what, there's nothing wrong with asking people. And actually it's the most sensible thing to do in the situation that we're in. But to go to a petrol station or a supermarket and ask somebody, you know, to places where one, there's CCTV, so everything's captured on CCTV. And two, it's, you know, it's a public place. So it was just, yeah, it wasn't too late at night, thankfully. Um, But yeah, it was and, and just, you know, to say to it, you know, we can get through this. We can do this. It's, it's okay. We might be having a slight panic, but we're all good. You know, nothing bad's going to happen to us. But I think being a mum in that situation was I reacted completely differently to how I think I would have reacted on my own because I was conscious of having, you know, having her there and having to look after her. I had to snap myself out of it because I just thought this is going nowhere, nowhere quickly. And we're going to miss our flight because I'll still be driving around tomorrow morning

But of course now what you've got is a story that you probably reel out and tell people regularly and laugh about now, because once it's over and gone with, then it becomes just a great story, doesn't it?

yeah, yeah, I do sort of tell everyone. I mean, a friend of mine said to me, Oh, what did you learn from this? I was like, not to travel at nighttime. And she said to me, no, not to go anywhere without your husband. And I was like, why would I want to do that? I was

no, that's not, that's

I said no, because it wasn't practical. He couldn't come for various reasons. I said, so I'm not going to not go to things. I was like, it

limiting, wouldn't it? No,

really would.

thing.

It really would. And as I said, I'm not, you know, I've, I've driven all over the world. It doesn't bother me. I'm the one that drives because my husband says, I don't like driving on the other side of the road. And I'm like, well, I don't care. I'll just drive wherever. So that's never going to be for me. But, um, yeah, I'm not that sort of person that's going to be told like, you can't do

Yeah. Not to do it. No! And that probably wasn't the first time you've got lost. You've probably got lost while driving plenty of times and potentially it might not be the last time you get lost either. It's just part of driving, isn't it?

it is. I mean, I remember, very quickly, I remember when I did the first time move to Sydney and I had, this is in the day before Sat Navs, I'd been to Sydney once before, and I kind of didn't really have an idea where my friend lived. But again, I found myself driving over the Sydney Harbour Bridge, driving on the outskirts of Sydney and somehow found her house. I was just like, I had a map and I was a bit like, oh, I think that's where I've got to go. We'll just give that a go. But, you know, I think these are the adventures, aren't they? These are the things that you just kind of, you go, well, I did it and nothing bad happened to me. And I'm, You know, here to tell the tales and maybe be a cautionary tale or maybe be a tale of, you know, for somebody else. Go, you know, just ask someone there's always somebody that's willing to, as you said, there's always someone that's willing to help you.

There is. Definitely. Great. Oh, well, Jo, thank you so much for sharing your story. I hope everybody's enjoyed listening to that and can take from it something to help them as well. So thank you very much.

You're welcome. Thank you.

So for our final story, we wanna welcome on one of our friends, Stuart. And Stuart. I'm gonna hand over to you to introduce yourself to say who you are and what you do.

Okay, fantastic. Hello everyone. My name is Stuart and I own a driving school in Glasgow. And I own a training company called Bright Coaching. And I'm the head of engagement for the ADI NGC. That's, that's what I do.

Fantastic. Now, Stuart, we are so grateful to you for coming on to share your sat nav story with us. 'cause we were part of your sat nav story, which is obviously how we found out about it. So, over to you. Tell us about your story.

Tracy and Kev, not only were you part of my SatNav story, you were the cause of my SatNav story, because if it wasn't for you, there would be no story. So the story goes that Kev and Tracy, uh, were up in Glasgow, and you know, we go way back. We've known each other for many years. So as you do, we arranged to kind of meet for dinner in town. And I, uh, very, very generously offered to come and pick you up from your hotel. And drive to the restaurant, because your hotel was, from memory, about maybe 25 minutes, into Glasgow. So I'm, I'm from Glasgow. Glasgow's, you know, a reasonably sized city. It's quite a large place. I'll get my disclaimers out there right now. And it was dark. I'll get that disclaimer in there as well. I'll tell the story and then, then we can actually talk about, you know, my excuses. Um, so basically I, I jumped in my car and I had, you told me where you were staying and I kind of registered. Okay, that's fine. I know where that is. That's not a problem. But every time I jump in my car, I always, I always use my sat nav, even if I'm going. Somewhere that I know, um, I always use my sat nav because one of the things it's very good at is the live updates. It'll tell you when a road's blocked or there's, just kind of traffic jams because where I live, there's regularly, diversions in place and, and things like that. So. It was a Saturday night, the roads were quieter than usual, and I was following the sat nav, and after I'd been driving, I live in the south side of the city, I live next to Hampden Park, for those who know Glasgow, quite close to there. and Tracy and Kev were staying, north of the river on the very kind of far west end. Of the city. The Wild West, as, as sometimes referred to up here. Um, and that's, that's where I roughly knew I was heading to. But as I'm driving, I'm thinking about lots of other things because I've been working that day. And I started thinking to myself, this is taking me away that I've never been before. I don't, I don't know this way. This is not the way I would have went if I hadn't put the sat nav on. So then you have this, this is the first thing, isn't it? Is the sat nav right? Or is the sat nav wrong? And this usually happens when you're on a motorway and it wants to take you off because it's registered a tailback up ahead. And I hadn't registered, I'd probably registered quite late because I was distracted, I was thinking about other things, I kind of thought that I've kind of went this far, I'll just trust it now. Rather than doubling back, which would have taken longer. It's possible that I was already running a little bit late in coming to get you. Possible, but we'll never know because I can't remember that far back. And then the further I went, as I said, when we talk about Southside in Glasgow, what we mean by that is south of the river, the River Clyde. So I know that at some point I need to cross the River Clyde. And I'm thinking, what bridge is it taking me to? Is there a bridge that I don't know about? Between here and the Erskine Bridge, which is basically out at Loch Lomond. These, these are the bridges that I'm thinking about in my head. No, there must, there must be something, because I can see now in the map, it's showing you a way across the river. You can actually see a way across the river. And. I trusted the satnav said there must be something that I did not know about a bridge that I did not know about because it's not my most familiar side of the city. But no, there was no bridge.

What was there, Stuart?

Are you going to use this image on, on, on the show notes?

I will put the image on.

Okay, the, the, the sat nav, the sat nav had taken me to the location of the Renfrew Ferry, and the Renfrew Ferry, I was going to say for those who don't know Glasgow, that, that, just for those who didn't know, because I'm from Glasgow and I didn't know, the Renfrew Ferry is a passenger ferry. It's about the size of my car. It's about the size of my car. And it only runs between nine and five or eight and six, only runs between eight and six. And as you know, this is like quarter past eight at night. I'm coming to try and pick you up for an 8. 30 reservation or whatever it is. Um, so I then had to pull over and phone you and say, listen, sorry guys. We've got this reservation. I'm going to be late and it's a busy restaurant. We've got, we've got this reservation for this thing because for me to get to the Renfrew Ferry, I'm now out west. On the side, on the wrong side of the river, and for me to get back to a bridge, I need to go either to Loch Lomond, or I need to come back into town, which is a 25 minute drive, and then go 25 minutes west on the north. So it's going to take me an hour to get to you, and then 25 minutes back in, we're going to be an hour and a half late for dinner. So we had to just say, listen, you guys are going to have to jump a taxi, and I will get there, you'll probably be there before me. Because I'm lost in my own city. Um, and, and that's, that's my SatNav story. But it's, as we were talking about, it's, it's far more than a SatNav story. It's far more than a SatNav story.

I just love the story, Stuart. I just love it that it's, you know, it's, um, I, I love hearing it often,

yeah, yeah, I, I got that, I got that, yeah. Always here to help. But I was thinking about this before I came on, today. About what we're going to talk about, and I figured out what my first main, issue was. And it's probably on the GDE matrix under something, but I can't think what it would be under, but it was actually just a little bit of, over familiarity, that I'm not going to get lost. Kevin, Tracy are up from Leighton Buzzard in Glasgow. I'm not going to be the one who gets lost.

I know where they are

Yeah, so I don't need to do any route planning or anything like that. And the second thing that contributed to it was, I knew that you were staying in a hotel next to a hospital out towards the west and north of the city. And there is another, hotel. and hospital to the west of the city, not as far west as you guys were. But I probably confused that somewhere in my mind. I would have gone through the cloud tunnel to get to that. So that kind of over familiarity, a little bit of, um, confu of not, not, not even confusion. I just didn't give it enough thought. As to where exactly you were staying, that was, that was kind of a vital thing as well. aNd then all the kind of more general things come in that, I was probably rushing a bit because I was late. I was distracted because it had been a busy day at work. All these things are going on in my head. and yeah, so interesting from a, you know, this, this, this is what we do for a living, guys. And it's just so interesting that I was that guy. I was that guy.

it's that thought of, I don't need to worry about that because I know what's gonna happen. I'm gonna get in the car a certain time, put the sat nav on and off I go.

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, all that, over familiarity and all that kind of stuff. And I'm from Wasco and these guys are the tourists. I, even with all that, I've also got my sat nav is back up. And it all, it all failed. It all failed me. SO I guess the other thing to add into that is, In terms of what you guys do with confident drivers. I remember the point of the approaching point of, I was going to say no return, but the point of inevitable return, but I had to backtrack. Um, I remember. starting to tense up and that, that feeling in my stomach that I was going to be late because I really don't like being late. I'm always there, you know, 15 minutes early, earlier than I need to be. aNd I was anxious about the fact that, A, I was going to be late picking you guys up and I could picture you guys standing outside the hotel waiting for me. But I was also anxious about being late for the reservation at the restaurant. So I really don't like. being that guy. I used to work in hospitality, maybe it's that. And I I could just, I was really aware of that sensation and then that affects your decision making as well. I was super conscious of that, the further away I got from the bridge that I, that I should have been aiming for.

Yeah, definitely. And that is the truth for everybody, isn't it? When you have that dawning moment of realization, and then the what if thoughts start, and then those, you know, that fight flight freeze, those feelings, the natural feelings that we all experience, yeah.

And then just to build on that anxiety kind of thing, did, I, I did get to the restaurant and you guys did get to the restaurant and we met and we had a lovely meal and none of it mattered. None of it mattered. So all that stuff that's flying through my head about, oh no, they're going to think I'm an idiot. Oh no, the restaurant's going to be furious. All that stuff didn't matter. We got there maybe five, 10 minutes late or whatever, but in the grand scheme of things, it did not matter. whereas maybe, uh, and this is where I'm hopefully going to redeem myself a little bit, maybe a less experienced driver would have been starting to pick up the speed. And break the speed limit and starting to do more dangerous things to alleviate that anxiety so that they didn't, they weren't late. And all that kind of stuff. sO yeah, just so many interesting things from such a small story that is relevant to the way that we train people. The, the way that we train pdis and ADIs. but also learner drivers. Yeah, really, really valuable lesson, for me anyway.

I think it's also full license holders as well. We do in our training about the, the sat Nav says, you're gonna get there at 10 past nine, but you've got a reservation at nine. You don't like being late. What are you gonna do? side of things isn't, it comes in and it's like, are you tempted to

Yeah. So, so working out in your head. So if I drive 175 miles an hour, that'll chalk seven minutes off the journey time. Will I, will I get away with that?

And that is, that's the consequences that people deal with, isn't it? that's what happens and, trying to teach those, those coping strategies of what can you do in that situation. But yeah,

Yeah,

and it was a lovely meal as well, so.

It was a good meal. It's a very good restaurant. Yeah.

And so of course for us, the reason we were so keen for you to share the story is one because we've started this whole episode, the very first story was a fairy story as well. So it's nice for us to finish off with a fairy story at the end. Even though it was a passenger fairy tale, so it's fine. Yes, very different fairies. But also it's that thing for us is that this really can happen to anybody and it's not a reason. I mean, you've continued using your sat nav since, since this happened, clearly.

Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Um, the sat nav is part of everyday driving for me and I, I know that It's not always right as well. That's kind of an important fact. You get to know your sat nav, don't you? And you kind of know when you trust it and when you don't and all that kind of stuff.

So on that note. Thank you very much for sharing your story, Stuart.

You're very welcome.

Thank you. So just to finish off this podcast episode, I would just like to thank everybody who's taken the time out of their day to participate yeah, I mean, it's a real compilation of different stories, and we, yeah, we're so grateful to people for sharing those stories with us. Yeah, and normally Sat Nav stories are, you know, a bit funny as well, but they have a serious connotation to them, don't they? Potential things that have happened, so. Thank you. Yeah, absolutely. And the idea here of, of asking people to share their stories wasn't so that we can highlight mistakes or to, to laugh at people in any way. It really was to demonstrate that these things can happen too. anybody. Now, when I think about us and our road trips, oh my goodness, Kev, we have been on so many what we term our magical mystery tours. Well, yeah, because I just put the sat nav on, you know, if it's somewhere I don't know, I know, I genuinely know the first half of it. and there might be a sat nav is for if there's road closed roadworks or whatever traffic. Um, but the second half is normally somewhere where we just, just, just follow it really. And then we look at it and we go, yeah, go on then. It's going to take us 2 minutes shorter. And we end up in some weird and wonderful roads. Yeah, well, you do. My preference is if it's gonna, if it's gonna save us less than ten minutes, let's not bother, let's stay on the main road, because, um, through experience. Yeah, it's one of those things, isn't it, with me? I just go, come on, let's just follow it and just see where it ends up. You're an adventurer. An explorer, I like to call it. But, regardless of when it takes you off the wrong way, we know, we know that we can't always 100 percent trust the SatNav. We know that we need to look at road signs and everything else as well, don't we? And I think that is the story behind this is, SatNavs are a fantastic addition to help people. Yeah. But don't rely on them. You know, you still need to look at road signs, road markings, that side of things. aLso don't trust it's going to take you the most direct route. And it may be that you think, Yeah, no, I'm not turning there. I'll just carry on. Because it's, it's what makes you feel more comfortable. The sat nav will still get you back to that position where you want to be. And not to let it put you off. No, you carry on using it because it's a, it's an addition, it's something there to help you. So, yeah, use it wherever it takes you. So we hope that you found that episode entertaining, interesting. We hope you enjoyed it as much as we enjoyed recording it with everybody who came on and helped us out with it. And yes, we hope it resonated with you in some way. And maybe you've got a story that you'd like to share with us, then all of our contact details are in the show notes as always. And so all that leaves us to say is, until next time, have a great day, whatever you're doing.