onewhowalks.com
Garmin
inReach Mini 2
The one piece of safety gear I would not leave behind on a solo route.
navigation
kr 5000
Two-way satellite messaging, SOS, and live tracking with no phone signal required. The single item that changes the risk profile of a solo route.
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I carried the inReach Mini 2 on an 8-day loop through Tafjord in summer 2025. It rode in the lid of my pack the whole time, clipped to the zipper pull, and I mostly forgot it was there. That's the point. The unit weighs 100g. It doesn't change what you carry or how you move.
What it changes is the risk profile of going solo. On day four, I was two days from the nearest road with no cell coverage. I sent a position check to a friend back in Ålesund. He got it. That's satellite two-way messaging via Iridium, not a Wi-Fi hotspot, not a phone tower. It works in the Tafjord mountains and it will work in the inland sections of Norge på langs where cell coverage disappears for days at a time.
The honest limitations: there is a monthly subscription cost on top of the device price. Garmin sells you the hardware and then the airtime separately, and the cheapest plan that covers two-way messaging is not trivial over the course of a year. That's the real cost of ownership. The small screen and keyboard also make texting slow. Not frustrating slow, just slow. Composing a message is a two-minute task, not a two-second one.
Battery life is around 14 days in tracking mode, which sounds like a lot until you remember that tracking mode sends a point every 10 minutes. If you want more frequent updates, battery life drops. Manageable on a route where you charge regularly. Something to plan around on a longer section.
Compared to a basic PLB: a PLB is one-way SOS only, no texting, no tracking, no subscription cost, and cheaper. If the only scenario you're preparing for is full emergency extraction, a PLB covers it for less money. The inReach earns its cost when you need to say "I'm behind schedule, don't call SAR yet" or "going off-route tonight, here's my new camp." That two-way communication is worth more than it sounds when you're actually in the position of needing it.
The inReach Mini 2 is not a gadget pick. It's the device I carry because the routes I'm planning require it. If you're walking solo, far enough from roads that a real problem becomes a serious problem, this is the one item I'd put on the list before anything else.