I have to say that I love living in the future. One of my teenage daydreams was of a map that always showed what was around you (yes… even as a youth I had my geeky tendencies!) and nowadays that is readily available.

It was a positive boon yesterday. I had a gig near Bently off the A31, which isn’t familiar territory, and the navigation software on my tablet guided me there very well. Coming back, I wanted a more direct route so I ignored the directions on purpose at a couple of key junctions until it figured out that I wanted to come back via Newbury, which saves a few miles, and the device was able to recalculate until it matched what I wanted. Even more helpful was when I discovered that part of the A339 was closed for resurfacing and the directions helped me down a series of country lanes to get round the blockage.

There is of course the risk of the satnav ignoring the fact that the “road” is only a bridle path or being unaware of conditions but, although it took me through one or two areas which might have been perilous in the recent floods, it served me well. What did we do before satnav? Probably stick to the major arterial routes and hope that we didn’t encounter any diversions. Thumbs up to the future for making solo navigation a much easier task.