Moving in a New Direction

Thursday might be okay.

When my Samsung smart watch told me that I had climbed 127 floors at the end of one day (that's like climbing the stairs to the top of Seoul's Lotte World Tower, plus another four floors!), I knew it was time to look for a replacement.

I'm not saying that I couldn't walk that many flights of stairs in a day, but I'd have to intentionally set out to do that. Typically, on a good week, my average daily floor average rarely exceeded 20.

The watch also started counting floors while I was sleeping or sitting on the sofa, watching TV. Even when I was exercising on my stationary bike, it would tack on a couple of floors during a workout.

And it always bothered me that when I was cleaning the kitchen, constantly moving in a relatively small space, the watch would not count the footsteps that I took.

The Samsung Health app that I had on my phone was much better at recording movement. With my phone in my back pocket, it would record the steps that my watch missed. At the end of the day, the app on the phone recorded more steps than my watch.

And that also bothered me: even though the Samsung watch was supposedly synchronizing with Samsung Health, the steps were never in sync. Nor were some of my workouts. For example, if I completed a workout on my spin bike, the elapsed time would be put toward my overall daily activity. But if I went outdoors on my road bike, the elapsed time would not count toward my overall daily activity. Apparently, only exercise that I initiated through my watch, rather than through the app on my phone, or exercise that was detected by the watch were put toward my daily activity.

My goal for each day was to count at least an hour of activity. Imagine my disappointment, after a 75-minute ride, that my stats would show, as I climbed into bed, that I hadn't reached my daily activity goal.

Even though I would regularly restart my watch and that I kept the Samsung Gear and Health apps up to date, the problems seemed to mount. I had even performed a total reset, twice, without solving my issues.

After three and a half years with this watch, and more than five years with Samsung Fit Gear watches, it was time to look elsewhere.

Initially, I was tempted to upgrade to another Samsung watch: particularly, the Galaxy 3. I loved the Samsung Health app and have been a fan of Samsung products for many years. My last three smartphones, our main TV, and a soundbar have all been reliable devices. The only reason why I upgraded my last Fit Gear watch was because my first one wasn't waterproof, and I wanted to wear it while I swam laps in our local pool.

The Galaxy 3 garnered good reviews, was stylish, and—most importantly—would pair perfectly with the health app that I've used for years and with which I was most familiar. But the price point was more than I wanted to spend and I wasn't crazy that the wrist strap was leather. How would it hold up to a chlorinated pool?

DW has an Apple watch and suggested that I get one, but after being an Android convert, I wasn't interested in going back to Apple. And again, there was the price point. (DW might be all right with spending big bucks on a watch but I wasn't.)

I then began reading positive reviews on Garmin watches. For many years, Garmin has been a leader in sport watches and I found a model that seemed to fit what I was looking for, especially because DW (needlessly) worries about my overall health—heart rate, oxygen levels, stress levels (okay, that one is valid), and breathing, especially while asleep (I haven't used my CPAP machine in more than a year). The watch was stylish and had a plastic strap: perfect for water activities.

And best of all, I found this Garmin watch, the Venu, on the Aeroplan merchandise site, so I was able to use points, rather than cash, to purchase it.

Straight out of the box, I put the watch to the test, plotting my final ride of my LEJOG virtual challenge. The watch has built-in GPS, so it's super-accurate and it also provides ample heath stats at various stages of the ride.

When I set out on a ride, the watch automatically sends a notification to DW, providing her with a link that allows her to track where I am. When I was an iPhone user, I used an app called Cyclemeter to do the same thing. But with the Garmin watch, if I fall off my bike, the watch will send an emergency notification to DW, showing her where I am.

That gives her some relief when I head out on a solo ride.

My first ride with the Garmin Venu.

In addition to monitoring my heart rate, the watch will also warn me if my heart beats exceed a pre-determined rate: I have it set to notify me when I go over 100 bps when I'm at rest and already it has set off one warning (I was fine).

There are lots of features that I haven't used yet, like the music feature or Garmin Pay, where I can use my watch to tap and pay for any purchases. But I didn't use the music feature on my previous watches and I've never used my phone for tap-and-pay purchases, either.

I've also disabled the feature that tracks women-specific health, such as menstrual cycle.

One nice bonus with the Venu is its long-life battery. With my Samsung watches, I found that I had to charge it each night, that it couldn't go two full days between charges, and I didn't want to take it off during the day to top it up. As a result, there were many evenings when I would go to sleep without wearing it and would miss out on the sleep-monitoring features.

The Garmin watch can go about five days between charges, and in the week that I've owned it, I've only had to charge it once (not counting the initial charge). My sleep stats have been recorded every night, as I've been able to fully charge the phone in just over an hour (which I've done while watching TV).

I like how the watch displays little blue footprints that walk all over the screen to mark when my step target is reached, or doubled. It also seems to count the steps that I take as I clean the kitchen, so I'm getting a more accurate count.

I love how, so far, it accurately records the number of floors that I've climbed!

I'm still getting familiar with my Venu. I've customized the face countless times and I've added and removed widgets as I've tailored the watch to meet my needs. But so far, so good. Both watch and Garmin's Connect app have been perfectly in sync. The watch even synchronizes with my Conqueror Virtual Challenges app, so I don't have to manually record my daily distances on my virtual journeys, which was the case with my Samsung watch.

This year has been one that has seen me more active than I have been in decades. And with this new watch, I am hoping to accurately keep track of these activities. I'll let you know how it goes.

And who knows? Maybe, someday, I'll actually climb 127 floors in one day.