Originally Posted by
Brent.ff
I've used them for work and play. Simply put, dont use SPOT in Canada, as the satellite system is unreliable at our high latitudes particularly in treed or mountainous area.
Iridium is the way, so the inreach's work well. Can't speak to the Zoleo.
I have the regular inreach and wish i had the mini for convenience of size. Tons of storys in the mountain communities of spots being unreliable, and from rescue orgs wanting back and forth communication that is achievable through Inreach. I have a friend who spent the night roped into Mount Andromeda assuming that their SPOT message had gone out and someone was coming, but no way to tell..
I'd prefer something that doesnt rely entirely on phone, like the bivvy, as doesnt take much cold to sap a phone.
That being said, I use mine whenever backcountry skiing or doing bigger backcountry trips. The inreach saved me last year as we hiked 16 k, got rained on for 20 hours, but were able to get a forecast from my wife saying to hold out.. next day was beauty, and could send a 'at car, will have signal soon'.