SHERLOCK WARNOCK

Montana 680t

Around the first part of November Ken, my hunting partner, and I went bird hunting north of the Alpowa grade in eastern Garfield County, WA. When we met back at the truck Ken showed me this “gadget” he had found. The “gadget” was a Garmin Montana 680t GPS unit which appeared to have been out in the weather for some time. Even though long ago Ken was an Air Force pilot he is not much into technical gadgets now. He said, “You take it because I don’t want it”.

After getting home I checked the specs on this unit which also has a built-in camera and saw that it retails for $600. I knew someone was really upset to have lost it. I contacted Garmin only to find that the owner had not registered it. It would not turn on so I put it on a charger which did the trick. Most of the pictures on it appeared to be from a backpacking trip so that didn’t help. Some of the earliest waypoints were over in the Connell area so I put lost and found ads in the Connell, Othello and Lewiston newspapers as well as on Craigslist. The only call I got was from a lady in Orofino whose husband had lost one up in that area.

I had about given up and decided that I'd either convert in to my own use which would entail buying some more software or sell it and give the proceeds to Ken. So the other day as I was examining the contents it occurred to me that I might look at some of the old tracks which were archived in the unit and trace them back to a source. Most of the tracks were over water or in the back country but a few of the very first ones were in the Connell area. One I traced back to a company near Connell called Johnson Agriprises. This was my first and only call. The lady that answered the phone knew nothing about it but said their shop man was a hunter and he might know something about it. Unbelievably, that was the owner. Of course he couldn't believe that he would ever get it back. He had lost it while deer hunting back in October. He said he had been so upset about it that he still hadn't told his wife he lost it. That fellow must have been living right.

M/W