As we will be hiking some quite remote regions a satellite phone/pager will be our sole means of communication. Our intent is to keep friends and family updated on our progress so that they have a rough idea where we are in case of challenges.
Plans
I'm on the Garmin Essential plan for 18 euros per month. It includes 50 free text messages or weather requests each month, plus unlimited check-in messages. The smaller Enabled plan (10 Euros) is missing the unlimited checkins, while the the Standard plan (34 Euros) gives you 150 free messages and unlimited live tracking. More details are on the Garmin page
Messaging
There are three different type of messages that you can send:
Check-In Messages: There are three preset messages. You can configure the recipients at explore.garmin.com. Depending on your Garmin subscription, sending check-in messages are free of charge. In the configuration section, you can enable the option to include your latitude/longitude and a link to the Garmin map in each SMS message. This information is always included for email recipients
Quick Messages: You can create up to 20 predefined messages so you don’t have to type them while you’re on the trail. The number of free messages you get depends on your Garmin subscription; any additional messages are billed per use. You can create or edit these messages at explore.garmin.com.
Normal Messages: In the Garmin Messenger iPhone app, you can type any custom message and send it to both SMS and email recipients. These messages are billed the same way as quick messages.
You can configure the system to send all messages to any email/sms recipients. The great thing is that the unlimited check-in messages also include latitude/longitude information. Here is a sample message.
Arrived at Camp
View the location or send a reply to Peter Hoffmann:
https://inreachlink.com/<unique_code>
Peter Hoffmann sent this message from: Lat 48.996386 Lon 8.468849
Do not reply directly to this message.
This message was sent to you using the inReach two-way satellite communicator with GPS. To learn more, visit http://explore.garmin.com/inreach.
The Message contains a link to a the garmin inreachlink.com page where the recipient can check the current location on a map and a message box to respond to the sender:
As we do not want to spam all our friends with daily checkins I have build a little leaflet-checkin plugin and an imap scraper to pull and visualize the checkin/messages.
Build your own Tracking with Check-In Messages
For battery life reasons, we are not interested in real-time live tracking.
Instead, I’ve created a small script that checks a dedicated IMAP email account
for check-in messages and publishes them to a server, which then displays the
location of our most recent check-in. Sending a check-in once a day or during
each break when we are in more remote areas—should give our friends enough
information in case any problems arise.
A straightforward Python script connects to my IMAP server, retrieves all emails from
the Garmin InReach service, parses the message, timestamp, and latitude/longitude, and
then updates a positions.json file on my webserver.
Then a simple static html file with a leaflet map pulls
the positions.json file and displays the messages/checkins on the map.
A demo of the map is available at:
https://hoffmann.github.io/garmin-inreach-checkin-map/html/map.html
and you can checkout the code