Cassie said:

To add - On a daily basis, we had two mobile phones (one each) in case one broke/lost power or we were separated for any reason. Nominated an emergency contact (chosen carefully for calmness, balance, ability to know what to do etc. without undue fuss) who we contacted via text to let know all OK, general status etc. every few days. This contact plus an alternative also listed as first emergency contact on Spot - would be first to be called. Contact also had access to Google Map in between (we just filled the gaps e.g. why we were in a certain place maybe off route - by text where appropriate). Worked a treat for us.

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Great info Cassie, I run a tracking system and will be looking into some of the facilities you mention here, (grab all the opportunities that come your way and all that!) Mine is not sat phone compatible so would not have been ideal for you but \Rusty Rhinos used it earlier this year for their trip through the sahara and found that it did the job for them quite well; "which was nice".

Hi Ryder,
Have just been looking at your site - product looks really good. Is Pebbles your own creation? Had a look at Rusty Rhino's report on it earlier this year also. Very impressive. Would be interesting to see a demo of it some time - or maybe we could swap demos so you can see Spot in the flesh for your own purposes. Note that Pebble marketed for vehicle tracking or are you thinking of combining more personal usefulness?i.e. Noted the integration to Google Map use (like RR - we found a major 'must have' these days). Yeah - Spot is sat based. I see Pebble relies on GPRS and RR reports no real issues with this from his trip and this type of coverage improves all the time. Not something we would rule out. Decision for us was about cost, portability, durability, ease of use as well as intended use (emergency). Bells and whistles functionality re: tracking and google map invaluable. Hence decision for us to upgrade Spot so we can retain permanent record and load photos (might as well - dead handy stuff when your on the road - a pain in the ass to then come back and try to plot permanently where you've just been). Ours was for personal use rather vehicle but then we were with the vehicle most of the time so either device would kind of serve two purposes in a round about sort of way. We'll be keeping an eye on Pebbles.