Riding with a GoPro and losing your Garmin Forerunner 305

Last Wednesday I went for a ride at lunch time with a coworker of mine. I decided to take the GoPro Camera along with me for the ride, though not attached to the bike itself, or to me, I attached it to a 3 foot pole, that I mounted to the front of the bike.

If you’re thinking “boy, that sounds like it won’t work” you are correct. It didn’t work out very well, the pole wasn’t near stable enough for the camera, so it made for a very wobbly video of the ride. I still think it is interesting though, so I editing, sped up, slowed down, and uploaded it to YouTube. You can see it here.

As you can see the video isn’t worth much. I took what I learned from the experiment and tried to create a better mount for my car for the autocross this past weekend. That didn’t work out so well either, but you can read about that over on Project350z.com.

After the ride we got back to the car, and I remember getting ready to remove my Garmin Forerunner 305 from the bike, but I don’t think I actually removed it entirely. I did remove the camera from the bike, and put it in the car. Later that evening I went to look for the Garmin and it was gone, nowhere to be found.

I looked throughout my car, looked around my desk at the office, in the garage at the office, and even went to the location where the car was parked. Unfortunately I was unable to find it

I posted an ad on Craigslist in the Lost and Found section with the hope that someone would find it and return it, but I haven’t been that lucky. Speaking of not being lucky, or just being stupid. Today I went and picked up another Forerunner 305 off of someone on Craigslist, with two chargers and a heart rate strap, for $85. I thought it was a good deal, until I got home and realized that the UP button on the Garmin doesn’t work.

I think it will still work for what I need, but I won’t be able to do things like adjust the contrast. I’m tempted to take it apart and see if I can fix it, but so far I haven’t been able to get the Forerunner 305 to come apart. I should probably just leave well enough alone and use it as is.

Lesson learned! Don’t trust anyone selling anything on Craigslist, always test something before you buy it.