The Grey Nato - Ep 32 - Great Watches Under $250
Published on Tue, 18 Apr 2017 09:02:28 -0400
Synopsis
The podcast discussed various topics related to affordable watches, upcoming travel plans, and general updates. Key points included:
- Discussing options for watches under $250, including Seiko, Casio, and Vostok models.
- Sharing details about an upcoming dive trip to Clipperton Islands organized by Oris.
- Mentioning plans for a birthday celebration and crewing on a sailboat during a race in St. Bart's.
- Talking about recent purchases like a new Sony camera and a bottle of whiskey.
- Providing recommendations for affordable yet capable dive watches from brands like Citizen, Marathon, and Aqualand.
- Sharing details about the Timex Expedition Scout watch and a basic Casio digital watch as inexpensive options.
Links
Transcript
| Speaker | |
|---|---|
| Jason Heaton | Hey, how's it going? |
| James | Good. Good. How are you? |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah, not too bad. Not too bad. Nice. Nice to know that we've got Basel kind of done and out of the way. Thanks everybody for listening to the show. It's one of our most popular shows on record. Jason, what do you say we go in kind of the opposite direction with this show? Sure. Let's do it. So this week we're thinking cheap watches. So cheap of course is relative, but I think within the scope of either like decent quartz watches or entry-level automatics, sub $250 is a pretty good target to shoot for, wouldn't you say? Like that's, that I think would be within the range. I'm trying to remember like my earning potential when I was in say, late high school, university. I think if I really wanted to, if it was a goal of mine, I could have scraped together, you know, 250 bucks. |
| James | Yeah, I think that's a good level. I think it's also kind of a good challenge for us. I think, especially coming off of, you know, SIHH in Basel, I think 250 kind of gives us a little bit of a, I don't know, a bit of an interesting sort of a challenge to shoot for watches in that range, because it's not the range that we, you know, are typically looking in, and yet there are some kind of cool pieces in that area. |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah, for certain. So I think before we dig into that, we'll just do our normal kind of new business. We've both got some trips coming up that I think need some kind of preamble before we end up reporting on it later. Uh, so what have you got coming up in the next little while? |
| James | Yeah. So actually next week, uh, I leave for the Caribbean. Uh, it's a dive trip that, um, I'm going on to, uh, an Island called St. Bart's like St. Bartholomew, I think is the full name. Yeah. It's, uh, it's French for playground of the rich and famous, I think is what it means in French. I think most people kind of know it because it's, it's kind of one of the swankier zip codes in the Caribbean. And, uh, anyway, Richard meal does a trip there every, every April, I guess, for, uh, like a sailboat regatta that I think they sponsor one of the teams and they might be like a timekeeper or something for the race. Cool. And so they usually bring some, some folks down to kind of, you know, sip champagne and, and watch a really expensive boats, uh, narrowly miss each other. But I, I'm actually going to be diving there for three days. Um, my wife, Kishani, who does, Most of the photography for the dive reviews that I do is also coming. And so we're going to be doing about 10 dives down there, which I'm really excited about because I dove there a couple of years ago, just across the way on the nearby island of St. Martin. And it was surprisingly really good diving. And so I'm curious to see how St. Bart's is. But the other reason is I get to wear a Richard Mille dive watch. Oh, wow. To dive there. Yeah, it's the RM 32. And it's the titanium version. It's a flyback chronograph. It's pretty special to be able to dive with that watch. I mean, I'll be the first to admit that Richard Mille is not really in my wheelhouse in terms of the kinds of watches I usually, you know, I'm interested in or remotely can't afford. I think it costs probably half of what my house costs. But, you know, cool watch, great, neat opportunity to be able to take a watch like that, that's just so incredibly engineered and just stratospherically priced. And it's, it's the kind of piece that, you know, when you see it at SIHH, you, you know, you just think, does anybody ever take this diving? And, and I guess, uh, I guess I'll get to find out how it does. So just, you know, I hope the, the spring bars hold and, and the, you know, I screw the crown down properly before I go, but, uh, should be, should be fun. |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah. I mean, restart mill is one of those ones where they make these, you know, balls to the wall, really crazy designs, lots of technology, and then I mean, they have a history of kind of strapping them to some dangerous wrists. Yeah, right. Johan Blake and Rafa Nadal. Yeah. Rafa Nadal. |
| James | Bubba Watson, the golfer. Yeah. |
| Jason Heaton | Exactly. Yeah. So I think you're in good company and I feel like they're going to have a Richard Mill sort of spring bar set up. It'll probably made out of like some sort of particulate nanotube and, you know, Yeah, essentially indestructible, which is going to be just about perfect. I'm excited just to see the photos, let alone to hear how the trip is, because, you know, that's that's a nice ritzy location. But yeah, like you said, sipping champagne, you know, dockside while you watch the boats isn't really your jam, maybe for an afternoon. Yeah, yeah. Or an hour or two. But I think it's awesome that you and Gishani get to head down there and shoot some photos and dive with with a watch that I mean, otherwise probably The closest it gets to water is like if the guy stays inside his Ferrari when it's at the car wash or something like that. Yeah. They're just very, you know, they're very, you know, nouveau riche sort of watches and they have that kind of ethos. So it'll be a really fun story to see one, uh, underwater. |
| James | Yeah. And then, um, actually it'll be my birthday when we're down there next week. And, uh, um, actually on my birthday, which is Saturday the 15th, I'll be, um, crewing on, on the Richard Mille sailboat during, during the race. So. Oh, very cool. |
| Jason Heaton | That's a nice little birthday present. |
| James | It is. I mean, it'll be a really great memory to kind of have, um, something I, you know, won't do again, obviously. And, you know, I, I, I'm a little wary about wearing the watch while crewing on a sailboat. I had a mishap or a near mishap with my Rolex a couple of years ago where the bezel flew off and, you know, certainly could have been a lot worse, but a borrowed hundred thousand dollar watch is, it feels a little risky, but they said, you know, go ahead and wear it if you want. So, you know, clearly they've got, they've got more confidence in it than maybe I do, but. Certainly if a spring bar breaks, I probably won't be around for episode 33. |
| Jason Heaton | So I'll have to find myself a new co-host. Yeah. Right. Or we'll just retire the show at sea. |
| James | Exactly. Right. Yeah. You've got a trip coming up just a couple of weeks later that's diving, but it's probably kind of on the opposite end of the spectrum. It's a little more Spartan. Why don't you tell us about that one? |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah. So I'm going on kind of one of these once in a lifetime sort of opportunities. It's with Oris. I'm going with a member of their like somebody who was part of the Norris Club that won a gift prize. So I'm going to cover this kind of two-week live-aboard experience on a boat to Clipperton Islands and Socorro Islands, which are in the South Pacific. So we leave from the very bottom of the Baja Peninsula, so down by Los Cabos and that area. And from there, it's 80 hours under motor to where we'll be diving for a few days and then another kind of long trip to Socorro, where we'll be diving again. And, you know, it's a shark tagging and some kind of marine wildlife exploration and tracking and some beach cleanup. It's kind of a mixed thing. I'm not going to kind of go into a ton of the details because if I'm really honest, I don't know that much about what the scenario is going to be. The boat looks lovely. Oh, wow. And I'm going to get Nitrox certified on the way because what else are you going to do with 80 hours? So that'll be a little addition to my dive repertoire and I've got a bunch of, uh, I got all my gear serviced and I've got the GoPro all rigged up for underwater. So it should be a great trip. Obviously when I, when I get back kind of mid May, we'll do a full thing about what the trip was actually like. And I'll try and maybe share some audio from, I don't, not really sure yet, but we'll, we'll find some way of sharing some of that either through the normal channel or maybe through some new avenues for the Graynado. Uh, but that's with Oris. I couldn't be more excited. It's, it's well outside of my comfort zone. I mean, it's two weeks without, except for an emergency, the ability to say, even call home. Wow. And, and that sort of thing. And it's, it's, it's really a very remote, but it's also that, that sort of thing that I've, since I was a very little kid, kind of romanticized that, uh, Steve Zissou sort of out in the middle of nowhere, uh, you know, blue water, white death, tracking sharks, that sort of thing. So. Oh man. I'm, I'm very excited. I have trouble actually just kind of putting all of my thoughts together. Cause my brain goes in a million different directions when I start thinking about the trip, but that's in, um, in a little over 20 days and I'm still kind of arranging various pieces of gear and how do I get it all down there and, and, and, and then get it on the boat. And, and I'm, I'm very excited. And the, the overall expedition looks really cool. You can go to diveclipperton.n2pix.com or just greynator.com and hit the show notes. And you can get a better idea of the overall mission and who's involved as far as sponsors and what the goals are. But it looks like an amazing way to do a little bit of citizen science sort of programming and get hopefully up close to some sharks. There's, you know, a group of hammerheads that apparently live and migrate in that area and then some whales as well. So that would be all sorts of dreams come true in such a short period of time. |
| James | Wow. It sounds really awesome. I mean, I know you and I have You know, we talk a lot about books and movies and so many of the stories that we read and the movies that we watch, you know, a couple that you mentioned, um, you know, they're all about trips like this. Um, you know, blue water, white death is such a great example of, uh, it's a movie we've talked about on the show before. And it's, uh, um, you know, it's, it's just kind of a grand adventure. And I think the fact that you're, you're not quite sure what to expect or how to pack for it is probably, it's probably just about right. You know, you'll get on the boat. Yeah. It's part of the fun. Um, yeah, can't wait to hear about it. That'll be great. |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah, for sure. Uh, anything else new on, on your list? Anything, uh, new acquisitions or plans or anything? |
| James | Well, you know, funny you should mention, I just part of sort of an early birthday gift. My wife, uh, uh, presented me with a bottle of some very nice whiskey. It's, uh, it's an Aberfeldy. It's a 21 year old, uh, single malt. Oh, fantastic. You know, it came in a beautiful box and, and it's a beautiful honey color. And I just, I just kind of peeled off the wax. just before the show. So I'm sitting here with a very small glass, uh, as we're speaking here and I've taken a couple of sips of it and it's, uh, uh, it's pretty special stuff. I think it's going to be one of those, one of those scotches that I definitely will savor. There are some that, you know, you kind of drink more regularly, but this is probably one that'll last until, until next year about this time. If I'm, if I'm patient and have some self control, but it's, it's, it's pretty amazing stuff. So, |
| Jason Heaton | I've had I've had what I think it's their 18. Oh, not the 21. But you know, it was it was an older one. And I remember it being very, very good. It certainly upstages my Tetley tea that I'm enjoying. Taking care of these, not so much golden pipes, we'll say tin pipes. Yeah, trying to bring the best to the microphone. |
| [Unknown] | Yeah, right. |
| Jason Heaton | And, and yeah, that's great. That's another great birthday gift. That's really fantastic. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. And it's nice, nice to have something like that just to kind of really slowly enjoy and appreciate. Yeah. So many years went into its creation because some people don't realize, but the, uh, I'm sure a lot of our listeners know way more about scotch than I ever will. But the, uh, it's 21 years is the minimum age of the ingredients. I mean, that's a significant amount of time. |
| James | Oh, sure. Yeah. That's almost half my life. And it's well over half your life. So, I mean, this is, you know, you just trace back to, to what you were doing 21 years ago. And it's, uh, it's pretty amazing. This stuff was, was just being put in a cask back then. So. |
| Jason Heaton | I was kicking around in the woods with a slingshot and a pocket knife and like a whole sleeve of saltine crackers. That's what I did when I was that old. Now we're tens. |
| James | Yeah, right. How about you? You've got some new gear maybe for the Clipperton trip? |
| Jason Heaton | I got a problem, man. Sometimes you think my problem is watches or like jackets or camping gear that I have yet to really use. I keep amassing more camping gear, but let's be honest, my real problem these days is cameras. Oh, yeah. So I've bought another camera and Even casual listeners, because I bring it up so often, casual listeners will remember I just bought another camera. I just bought a Fuji X100T, which I love very much. For photography, it's very much like a photographer's camera with all the manual controls, and it's kind of a really beautifully built body. But what I found is after doing the vlogs with a blog to watch, I really wanted to have more of an ability to shoot kind of quality, but on the fly video, something a big step up from what the GoPro can offer, but not a lot bigger. |
| [Unknown] | Yeah. |
| Jason Heaton | You're too kind to say it, but I'm sure you're very tired of the amount that I've been talking about cameras in our Slack chat. But I finally pulled the trigger, so I bought the new Sony a6500. So it's their small magnesium-bodied APS-C camera, and it shoots 4K from a down-sampled 6K sample, so it shoots beautiful video. And they have a fantastic reputation. And you have some experience with the E or I guess with your cameras, it'd be the FE mount. |
| [Unknown] | Yeah. |
| Jason Heaton | But there's actually a wider selection of lenses than I expected. You get kind of spoiled if you're in the Nikon or Canon world, because there's just so many lenses you could choose from old, new, expensive, cheap. And I was surprised to see that, you know, even though the NEX and then now the Alpha platform has really only been around for certainly less than 10 years. They have a pretty wide range of lenses. And so I have the camera and a couple extra batteries and I bought the kit lens, which seems like it will do really well for sort of photojournalist video. Like I'd like to shoot some video on the Clipperton trip so that you can see what it's like on the boat and not just when I'm diving with the GoPro. |
| [Unknown] | Yeah. |
| Jason Heaton | So that comes in in a couple of days. Unfortunately, it probably means I'm going to have to move the Fuji. just too similar in terms of size and the way that I'll use them. The Sony will take a beautiful wrist shot and do those sorts of things for me as well. I'm going to miss the Fuji because, again, the Sony feels more like a computer that you attach a lens to. I mean, it's a touchscreen. It doesn't have a lot of like physical controls for the... I mean, it has them, but they're just kind of buried in kind of remote control-esque buttons. Unlike the Fuji, where you have a big ring for the aperture and another one for the shutter speed. This is a little bit more of a computer approach to photography, but it does have the EVF, the electronic viewfinder, which will be nice to use and great big touchscreen for focusing. So I'm excited to kind of come to terms with yet another platform, but something tells me I may be slow to actually list the X100 on Craigslist because I've really loved having it and just kind of keeping it under my arm as I walk around town. |
| James | Yeah, I think, you know, as we've discussed many times over, I think on both of our ends, it's really tough to find just the perfect camera. I think I've described it as it's kind of like a puzzle. Especially in your situation where you want to be able to shoot video and you like kind of the feel of an SLR or a camera that has some manual controls and you want the ability to shoot some good still shots. It's just really hard to find great stuff out there that can do it all. I guess, you know, you've had some experience, I guess, with the Mark IV 5D. Oh, yeah. But, you know, maybe not as portable or light. The, you know, the Fuji does one thing well. The GoPro is going to be great for underwater, but isn't the best thing for topside. And then you've got to deal with microphones. Yeah. So I'll be curious to hear your thoughts. I think it sounds like it's a good purchase. I mean, it won't be for lack of research. I know you've really looked into this a lot, so. |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah, I've dug around a lot. I think I've watched almost all the YouTube videos about these cameras, and the 6300 looked like a pretty great buy, but with the 65 out, and I just want to have, in this situation, kind of the best one I can. It wasn't that much more money, so I went with the new one. And I think to kind of slot in between the Canon, the Mark III that I have, which is fantastic for photos, and I love shooting watches with it, and cars, and all sorts of stuff. And then the GoPro at the other spectrum, which is just fairly straightforward and simple to use. And obviously does things like the underwater or, you know, situations where you wouldn't dangle a different camera. |
| [Unknown] | Yeah. |
| Jason Heaton | Um, and I think to put something right in the middle, the 6500 looks like a good option. I probably won't invest much in lenses. I'll stick with the kit lens for now. And then maybe, maybe find something for a very specific purpose later or, or just go with the ultra wide. They make a 10 to 18, uh, that looks great. And it seems seemingly very sharp. Uh, so the, you know, lots of options and obviously the nerd side of my fascination with cameras loves the fact that I'm now moving on to yet another platform, but I did really enjoy the X100 and it's, you know, it was a fixed lens. So I didn't have to think about the DSLR aspect of like changing lenses or switching lenses. You just kind of operated it similar to a 35 mil. And, uh, and, and I liked that, but I'll report more obviously, once I've gotten a chance to get the camera and use it, and hopefully we'll have some fun video or something to share post Clipperton. Providing I don't mess it up or dunk the camera in the ocean or who knows. Fingers crossed from all that kind of stuff. |
| James | Yeah. Well, that's exciting. I mean, there, there are certainly far worse vices to have than, uh, than, you know, flipping and collecting cameras. And I think, uh, you know, you're someone that'll use it and use it well. And even if it's just for this one trip and, and you get some good footage out of it and then sell it when you come back, I mean, who knows? |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah. We'll see how I like it. |
| James | Yeah. Well, let's move on to some watches, huh? |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah, let's let's hit the main topic. So again, as a palette cleanser for kind of the end of the big show season, we're talking watches under $250. I think for our intents and purposes, you know, with the Grenado $250 represents a cheap watch. And I think you'll find that we have watches so far under that limit, that it would be hard to really claim that we're really too far out of touch by saying $250 is cheap. I think the list that we've kind of amassed is not exhaustive. but it has something for everyone. |
| James | Yeah, I agree. And I think, um, sub 250, it's kind of, uh, you know, I think when you first kind of proposed this show topic a while back, I thought, can't we, can't we kind of up the limit to 500? Because when you move up to sub 500, there just are a lot more, I guess, obvious choices. And I think at 250, you have to look a little harder, but you end up with some really satisfying watches that, you know, pretty much any of these on our list that we're going to talk about, I would I would happily wear in many situations. |
| Jason Heaton | So yeah, we tried to limit our list to not necessarily the best watch from any brand that we mentioned, but the ones that we would wear on our wrist and might even spend our own 250 bucks on. So for international listeners and for myself, it's 250 USD. So if you're spending Canadian dollars like I do, that's a bit of a bummer. It's a little bit more, but using most of retail in North America is going to roll on the USD. So I think it's fairly accurate, especially when you start to look at the, a lot of the pricing from gray market options out of Southeast Asia are also readily in USC. So I think that's a fair currency as well. So there's a few stipulations. It's not an exhaustive list. If you have a really great idea for a sub 250 watch that we missed, just write us at thegraynadoatgmail.com. I'd be more than happy to come back to this in a few months. and talk about the sub 250 watches that listeners actually wear and have abused and have taken all over the world. With that in mind, you want to hit the first one on the list for us? |
| James | Yeah, well the first one that I have, I think it's kind of an interesting or maybe a fitting follow-up to your upcoming Clipperton trip and the fact that it's a watch that people might be familiar with from the Steve Zissou movie. |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah, from Life Aquatic. |
| James | Yeah, the Life Aquatic. It's the Vostok Amphibia. And, you know, Vostok is a Russian watch brand that's been around for a while. And the Amphibia is a watch that I think would be familiar, you know, if you can't picture it, it's almost a... It doesn't really look like anything else out there. No, it really doesn't. It's a dive watch, but there are a number of sort of different dial variations with kind of funky, almost cartoonish patterns on them. Some have anchors, some have kind of some real, um, you know, interesting fonts and texts. Um, but the bezel has sort of, it almost looks like Morse code. It's sort of dashes and dots in red and blue, uh, and black in some cases. And you know, it's, it, it's, um, I wouldn't say it's, uh, you know, I haven't, I've handled one maybe once and, and it, you know, it felt like a decent little watch. It's certainly not going to be at the quality of, Maybe what you could get in this price range in a Seiko, but if you want something that doesn't really look like anything else, and it's kind of an interesting talking point, or maybe you're a Steve Zissou fan, they're like $84 on Amazon. So I think that's kind of a, it's one of those watches where if you buy it and you don't like it, you're, you're just not out that much money and, and it's certainly kind of a fun piece. So that's kind of my first foray. |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah, I think these, I think these amphibias are not, not that expensive. And this is kind of like at 84, I'm actually looking at about five others that are under 80. So there's a ton of versions. They would get even cheaper if you decided to go secondhand. Oh, yeah. And I think they're just kind of a fun, a fantastic beater if that's what you're looking for. I don't think you'd have to worry about abusing a watch like this. I think you could wear it like you would a G-Shock. Yeah. And, you know, simple mechanical movement and a lot of them just come on a straightforward bracelet or rubber. They're nicely legible. They don't, like Jason said, they don't look like anything else. And I think that's a great, great spot to kick it off. We're well under a hundred dollars and well, well below our $250 limit. For the next one on the list, I would actually go with the kind of gold standard of the entry-level automatic, which is the Seiko SKX007. Yeah. |
| James | A watch everybody should own. |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah. If you don't have an SKX and you haven't owned one, I would actually just say that you're kind of denying yourself one of the simple pleasures of sport watch appreciation. And you're looking at gray market sites that we checked on online at about $190 including shipping. Amazon's got them for like $210. And I've seen them for not much more than that, like still under $250 in retail. So, I mean, if you're going to be on a cruise anytime soon, a good time to scope out what they've got as far as Seikos and that sort of thing. Easily found under $250, an absolutely killer watch. Mine just went in for service at eight or nine years. It was still keeping reasonable time if you just measured it again. Cause I mean, you know, no hacking. So you're not really zeroing the seconds that carefully and then put it on the machine and it had some amplitude issues. So they're, they're fixing it. But just a bulletproof watch, you could mod one about 10,000 different ways. If you didn't really like the aesthetic, but wanted to maintain that kind of build quality for the price. |
| [Unknown] | Yeah. |
| Jason Heaton | And, uh, and, and just a winner. |
| James | Yeah, it is. I would even say if we were to do a show at sub $500 watches, this would easily stand shoulder to shoulder with anything else in that category as well. It's, it's just such a fantastic piece. And, you know, you mentioned the timekeeping and I think You know, you have to set good expectations when you're talking about watches in this price range, especially the mechanicals. You know, we're not talking chronometer certified watches here or even, you know, really great timekeeping. Some of them will do well. You mentioned your 007 isn't too bad, but, you know, I'd say, you know, on average, probably with a lot of these, we're talking plus or minus 30 seconds a day might be a reasonable expectation. |
| Jason Heaton | I think the 7S26 that's in these SKX models and in a lot of the Seiko 5s that we're going to mention is rated to plus minus 20 seconds. So a 40 second spread, really, I mean, if you want more than that at the price point, you will probably have to go quartz. I've seen a lot of guys online, you know, go into the 6R movements from Seiko, which are a couple levels above the 7S26. And even those with careful regulation don't really deliver the same sort of performance that you would kind of more readily expect of something like an ETA 2824. It obviously depends on who's fine tuning them and how well the movement was made originally. There's some variance in, uh, in the kind of more entry level Seiko movements, but within that variance of say maximum somewhere around 40 seconds a day, mine ran like that for many, many years. Yeah. Yeah. With a ton of abuse. Yeah. And if you want something ever so slightly better, we were able to find the SRP 775, which is the gold, the one with the gold accents, which is the turtle, the watch that we love. Now, a turtle of the 777 and the 779 is pretty readily available at, say, $275? |
| James | Yeah, closer to $300. So if we kind of tweak our price range a little bit and people stretch a little bit, you know, the 777, the one that we like, of course, you can find it all day long at that price. |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah, so I mean, if you are wanting something, you already have a 007, you want something with slightly different aesthetic, only slightly really, or you want something with a slightly better movement, you know, you move into a 4R series movement with the 777Xs. We were able to find the 775 for $245, so just barely into our price point. It's up to you whether you like the gold. If not, I mean, for the cost of you know, a kind of a cheap dinner, you could be at the, at the next one. I don't really want to bend the 250 price point too much, but if you are going to bend it for a watch, do it for the 777. Yeah. |
| James | Yeah. I think, you know, stick with Seiko. I mean, you've got a list here. I mean, the Seiko 5 is kind of the, another kind of classic category for Seiko. It was kind of there, it's been around since I think the sixties or seventies. And it's, it's always been, If you talk about Seiko being a bargain, the Seiko 5 is the real bargain basement of Seikos and yet they're still such sturdy, fantastic watches. Yeah, for sure. You've got a few listed here. You've got the Solar Patty one. |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah, so with a lot of these, now we're into the meaty zone of the stuff I recommend to my non-watch nerd friends. So when somebody comes to me and they go, oh, I want to buy a watch and you know watches, what would you buy? I usually say, Oh, well, you know, what do you want to spend? And if they come in under 200, 200 or $300, which is almost, almost always they do. I just say, Oh, well, you, you know, go with, uh, go with a Seiko 5. And so if you look at one, uh, one that I've recommended now to four or five people, and none of them have had an issue with it. And all of them wear it every single day. Like these are one watch folks, not watch nerds. This is the SNZG15J. There's like four or five different versions. So this is a 41 millimeter kind of pilot style field watch, simple steel case, super legible, got some loom, Day-Date. You can't beat it. It's a hard Lex crystal. You get a hundred meters water resistant, and you're looking at $125, $125 US dollars shipped from, I found them on several of kind of the popular gray market retailers, but If you want specifics, this is via Creation Watches, which I think is out of Southeast Asia. I've bought probably more than 10 watches from them over the years and never had an issue. Yeah. And so that, you know, that's an option. You also, if you want something a little bit more divery, you have the kind of what's called the baby monster, the Seiko 5 SRP481. But again, there's a several versions. This is just one. It has a white dial with kind of blue accents. And that one you're looking at $154. And that's also that's a little bit bigger at 43 millimeters, a 4R36 movement for that money is fantastic. Hardlex crystal, 100 meter water resistant that comes on a full bracelet, kind of a monster style bracelet, which is a great bracelet. And then if you want something even more fuss free, Seiko makes a bunch of these solar divers. So for fun, I just picked a random one. that was on the site, and this is the SNE435, and it's a PADI, so I actually think it's a great color scheme, maybe one of the better PADI color schemes. Yeah. |
| James | It has that sort of three-dimensional dial. |
| Jason Heaton | It's really cool. Yeah, yeah. 43.5 millimeter steel case, uses a solar movement, the V157 Seiko solar movement, and otherwise just a straightforward 200-meter water-resistant dive watch, 210 bucks. Perfect. Perfect dive watch. |
| James | There's so many great options. Yeah. I mean, it's like a 200 meter dive watch, you know, in a steel case from Seiko. You know, for somebody who's like using it as intended as, as a sports watch and banging it up while they're, you know, kayaking or hiking or, you know, taking, you know, getting their open water certification or something, it's, it's just such a perfect choice. And I think the thing about Seiko 5 and same with you, I mean, when, when I get questioned by people who are either just getting into watches or maybe they want to buy a gift for somebody. Um, this is, this is just the, it's the default recommendation, the Seiko five and that SNZG 15, the first one you mentioned, you know, it has a, it has a display case back. It's crazy for a watch that you can get for $125 and I always, I see a watch like that and I think to myself, if you're going to buy a gift for, let's say a relative who's graduating from high school or something and you want to get them kind of a neat, gift and sort of maybe you're, you want to introduce them to mechanical watches, you know, here's a watch where they flip it over. They can see that the rotor spinning, um, they can see the, you know, the balance wheel, you know, flipping back and forth. And I just love that, you know, it's the movement is nothing special. I mean, there isn't anything decorated about it or anything, but it's, it introduces people at such a low price point to what a mechanical watch can be. And they'll have it for years. I think that's, I think that's a great choice. |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah. And they also make a version at, I think, 37 millimeters, which is much more reasonable, uh, just depending on your tastes. I've seen both the 41 is great and you still get great loom. Uh, you know, these three and the two plus the Patty solar, which is actually part of prospects watch with great price for a prospects piece. Yeah. I think these are, these are like cream of the crop sub $250 watches. So you've got to spread from 125 to 210 bucks there. Very wearable. You got different sizes. They're all Seiko, so you get good lume. And then the only other one I would add is a watch I owned very early in my kind of watch interest career, which is the Seiko SNA411. And it's kind of like if you imagine a quartz Seiko Navitimer. |
| [Unknown] | Yeah. |
| Jason Heaton | But even that, it doesn't really even look that much like a Navitimer. It's just this kind of burly pilot's chronograph with a very deep dial. It comes in an all black dial which is that the 411 is an all black dial with yellow accents and it's a great quartz chronograph. I gave it to my brother after I kind of, not lost interest in it, but had too many other watches. Yeah. And I believe he lost it somewhere, left it at the gym and then it was gone. But somebody out there still has that watch. It would be indestructible. It just needs a battery. Yeah. And those are about 205 bucks. That's about what I paid many years ago. An embarrassing, you know, seven, eight, nine years ago. It also comes in a version with kind of like a panda sort of white dial with blue sub dials. I would call it like a Tommy Hilfiger. It's got red accents. Yeah. Yeah. And then there's like a full plated gold version with the black. If you want to go full flash, those are the ones you see on like cruise ships. Oh, sure. But I don't remember what they are. It's the SNA4 something, 17, 15. I'm not sure. But the 411 I think is actually a really cool watch that you don't hear that much about. Yeah. |
| James | And it's a chronograph and it's an alarm and it's 200 meter water resistant. So, you know, yeah, just. Just a great bang around watch and it kind of looks cool. It's got the slide rule bezel. Yeah. Yeah. |
| Jason Heaton | And yeah, that's one of those ones you size the bracelet and you're done. |
| [Unknown] | Yeah. |
| Jason Heaton | But I bet, I bet, you know, you'll get at least a few years out of it and then the battery is going to be like a $20 thing at a store and you're ready to go again. |
| James | Yeah. You know, Seiko is kind of the default choice at this category. I think another obvious hit in the sub $250 category is obviously a G-Shock. For sure, and I know you've owned a few that I'll just chime in at first here with the one that I'm not a g-shock fan personally. I just the aesthetics don't appeal to me, but the one that I would own I think it was probably The the one that pays homage to the first one, which is the DW 5600 which is kind of the simplest looking rectangular one Probably the least bells bells and whistles on it And you've got one here listed for I think $70 |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah. And I mean, you can find them for less. Every now and then I've walked into a Walmart while killing time. I mean, I used to have family in the South and I walked into a Walmart in Mississippi and they had various versions of the 5600 for like $35 US. So, I mean, this is just a quick Google search. If you dig around, you can find 5600s and they come in like every color. You can get them in negative LCD if that's your preference, where it's a black face with kind of white letters. Yeah. And these are bulletproof. They make atomic versions, which will cost you more, maybe as much as a hundred, $120. And then they make like fancy limited edition versions. It never ends with G-Shock is kind of what I'm getting to. But the 5600 is like, it's the one you see on military a lot. It's the one you see on cops a lot. It's the one that just kind of, you see in everyday life, kind of like in the same way as the Timex Iron Man. |
| [Unknown] | Yeah. |
| Jason Heaton | There's a lot of guys that are buying them. whether they like watches or they don't, or they just think that this is the right one. Cause it's nearly indestructible, simple, not especially big and certainly not flashy. And I think that's their strong point. And you can even go up to a, they make a model that I found for about 190 bucks that has like full Bluetooth connection to your phone. And we'll give you, I think I'm not sure if it vibrates. I should have checked that. That's the killer feature. If you're going to do the notification so that there's not always beeping. But it's got a little indicator on the screen to tell you when you get an email or a call or those sorts of things. So that could be fun depending on how you want to use the watch. It gives you just enough of the handy part of a smartwatch. Right. And I mean, my taste in G-Shocks lies firmly into the Protrek range. And you can find the triple sensor, the 270, which is the last generation. I found them for as low as $130. That's a lot of watch for $130. Altimeter. barometer compass, that's their, their triple sensors, the latest generation of their ABC. Yeah. And I mean, that's still like a big chunky watch and, and they have a nice kind of, the Protrex have a really nice kind of expansive open screen that allows a lot of light and it's very easy to read. And I've used quite a few of those kind of hiking and adventuring and they're fantastic. And you can get the newer-ish model, which is the, um, the 3000 series. For I found them for as little as 180 bucks. I've seen those on watch recon and I don't know why you wouldn't buy a used g-shock Nobody's gonna do that much to it. Yeah, right. I i've seen them on watch recon for like 100 bucks You know, it's funny, you know ship ship from some guy and that's a lot of watch if you want to watch to beat up On the weekends. Yeah, and and not not beat up some nice watch you were to work Killer option. |
| James | Yeah, it's funny. You know the g-shock always gets a pass from kind of the the watch nerd crowd at any level it just has sort of universal respect and it's funny because the rest of the watches that we're talking about on our list are by and large if not exclusively analog dial watches with either mechanical or quartz or maybe an eco drive movement or something and yet the g-shock you know you're talking about the the protrek watches the triple sensors it it's funny because we don't talk about maybe we could have included like a sunto or you know, something like the Suunto Vector or something like that. |
| Jason Heaton | I think the base core might be under $250,000. |
| James | Yeah. So, you know, we haven't really talked much about digital watches in general on the show. I think you and I aren't averse to it. I think, you know, given your recent aerospace purchase and a couple of my watches, you know, we certainly aren't averse to a digital screen on a watch. But the G-Shock, it kind of occupies a space of its own. And I think it's just such a cornerstone of this price category for a lot of people. |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah. And they're more readily found cheaper than a Suunto. I mean, I've seen some Suuntos on sale that were excellent, but I think that's the way to buy the Suunto. But yeah, I've had a handful of Protrex. I had a Rangeman that I absolutely adore. The Rangeman costs more than $250, but not used. So, I mean, if you're okay with the case size, which I, if I remember correctly, it's like 54 millimeters. |
| [Unknown] | Yeah. |
| Jason Heaton | That's a killer watch. It has all the features. and is very wearable despite its size. It's kind of like a Frogman if you're in, if you're in kind of the range for that. And the Frogmans, of course, are quite expensive as well. But I also have a, you know, a Garmin, I have a couple of Garmin Fenix watches, which are quite large, but have lots of great features and are very useful. I don't wear them day to day. I do wear them kind of tool based the same way I use my dive computer. That's how I view a watch kind of like this. And maybe that's unfair, but that's more or less how I wear a digital watch. |
| [Unknown] | Yeah, sure. |
| Jason Heaton | his first, you know, some specific use or feature, you know, whether it's wanting the chronograph when I'm cooking something or if I'm going on a hike or I'm going diving, I'm going on a run or something like that. |
| James | So we've, we've kind of, uh, you know, Japan and Asia sort of dominates this, this category for, for a number of reasons. And I think we've talked about Seiko and Casio and, um, the other big player of course is, is citizen. And there, there are definitely some good choices in that category. Um, you know, the, the, uh, That Seiko Pilot's Chronograph with the alarm that you mentioned earlier reminds me a little bit of one of my favorite sort of citizen pilot themed watches, which is that the Nighthawk series. And I think you see a lot of those on actual pilots on again, on, on cops and on cruise ship sales and things like that. But the Nighthawk is another kind of killer watch. I think in this range as well, we're kind of creeping up to the upper end of our price range, but still at, you know, what you have it listed here at 229. That's a good looking watch. |
| Jason Heaton | That's a great watch. And the Nighthawk is actually one of these ones that has like a really solid nerd cred. I remember it was one of the first watches I was introduced way back when I got into the internet side of learning about watches on the poor man's watch forum. Yeah. There's a huge contingent of Nighthawk fans because you're, it's a 42 millimeter steel case with a date display, a second time zone and good loom on the hands, a nice bracelet and yeah, $230. For all I know, you wait around for a sale. It's even less. Citizen's also one of these ones that's generally well-represented in your local mall. Yeah. And every now and then you go to the mall and it's like a big sign that's like, oh, it's 70% off. Yeah. Maybe just keep the Nighthawk in your brain and you'll come by one even less than $230. I don't know. At $230, it's EcoDrive. It has a good feature set. It's super legible, super wearable. I think it's an absolute winner. I mean, I think in some ways it's like the Citizen Ethos in an entry-level piece, an entry-level sport watch. Yeah. And, you know, the only other one that I would say would sit along this is actually a little bit more at about $300. It wasn't when I bought it. It was a little cheaper. It was one called the BL-5250, and it's a titanium quartz piece, eco-drive with a perpetual calendar. It's a fantastic watch. I had that one for quite some time. It was super light on wrist. I think it's quite an attractive watch. Check out the 5250 in our show notes. I'll put a link to it, despite the fact that it's over the price point. Between the two, I think the aesthetic I sit with these days would be the Nighthawk. I think it would look great on a NATO. The bracelet looks very nice. And I do like a kind of fuss-free, long-term outlook with EcoDrive. I don't want all my watches to be EcoDrive, but I do really like the idea behind it and the functionality. |
| James | Well, what's cool about EcoDrive, at this price range is for for guys like us who you know we've got our our Rolexes and our Bramonts and things that we we tend to wear more often. The eco drive is the kind of thing you keep on your desk or your side table and when you want to wear it it's ready to go you know so you're not you know fiddling around with it setting it things like that and the other thing I like about this Nighthawk too is you know Citizen makes another kind of pilot's watch called I think it's called the Skyhawk which is more expensive and it's it's just such a busier look The Nighthawk, it has kind of big sword hands, the big markers. It just has more of a classic aesthetic to it and the bracelet's kind of conservative. I just think it's a killer watch. Yeah, I fully agree. I've got a couple of Citizen dive watches that I added to the list, one of which is the BNO151-09L. You know, Citizen always has these. and Seiko as well, these long sort of alphabet soup names. But this is just sort of a classic analog dive style watch like dive watches have been built since the 50s. It's the rotating bezel, it's the broad hands, big markers. This one is an EcoDrive with 200 meters water resistant. It's a 43 millimeter steel case with kind of the accordion or vented rubber strap. It's just kind of a simple, classic looking dive watch which um, you know with with the eco drive again, it's the kind of thing that I always think you know You you pick it up when you're going to go do some sort of water sports or or you know Kind of go do some yard work or something on the weekend and it's there for you And um, you know, just just kind of a nice looking watch they make they make automatic versions in this similar aesthetic Yeah, the ny40 the ny40 which you know is out of our price range But uh, if you want that same look, I think this is the way to go. It's a great watch Agreed. I think they look fantastic. And that one's about, I found it for about $200 on Amazon. And then the other one, which is a bit of a favorite of mine is, is in the Aqualand family. I'm a big citizen Aqualand guy. And Creation Watches have, has the, I think it was kind of the considered the Aqualand 2 watch. It's the, it's the watch with kind of the analog digital dial. This one that I just chose. has an orange dial. They make some in some different colors as well, but it's a little bit kind of a goofy looking case. It's got some kind of garish looking lugs and things, but it has that two window dial with, with skeletonized hands and a depth sensor. And for, for someone who's into diving and wants a watch that has a depth sensor, maybe you're using it as a backup to your computer or you just, you know, want it for fun. pretty tough to get into a watch like this for this price range, but, uh, uh, creation watches has it for, for 210 bucks right now. And, and, you know, you get all this stuff, you get water temperature, you get calendar, you get an alarm, you know, chronograph, if you want to go running or swim laps with it or whatever. And, uh, you know, uh, another good choice. I think citizens, another one of these brands that, uh, fits squarely in our, in this episode, it's perfect. |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah, that one's quirky and fun. I wouldn't call it pretty by any stretch. Certainly the, uh, the previous one that you mentioned, the BN015109L is a bit of a prettier diver, but for your kind of full featured pseudo dive, you know, one step under a dive computer, Citizen has a nice history with these and the Aqualand ProMaster stuff's pretty cool. |
| [Unknown] | Yeah. |
| Jason Heaton | And you want to buzz through a few more. We've got a few more brands to go through. |
| James | Yeah, maybe we finish off Japan by looking at Orient, which I think is a sub-brand to Seiko. I think you've got one on the list here, a Mako. |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah, so I had a Mako. I'm actually not a huge fan of this watch personally. It's something about the way it wears on wrist, but they're insanely popular. It's a solid dive watch at that price point, and it is at a very fair price point. It's a $170 is what the one I found, although that might be a sale price. And that was, you know, we'll, you'll, you can find all these links in the show notes and stuff, but I think these are readily available at sale prices, basically being, being what they are. But Orient makes a handful of dive watches. I had one way back in the day called a Red Beast. Oh yeah. And it used a citizen movement of some, like a, probably what is now a Miyota movement with a little power reserve. And, uh, and, and then I think, you know, you had a saturation, the 300 meter diver, which is well out of the price point. Yeah. But Orient, it's not like Orient's only dive watch. So, I mean, if you're kind of on board for the way it looks, I really didn't love the way it sat on my wrist. I had one many, many years ago and, uh, and sold it, uh, shortly thereafter, but there was nothing wrong with the way it was built. Certainly nice, uh, simple automatic dive watch. A good, good competitor to something like an SKX, if you already have that, or if you look at the SKX and you just can't get behind it or are so tired of seeing them on Instagram or something like that. Yeah. And how about Marathon? They've got a pretty good option, just a hair over 250. |
| James | Yeah, Marathon's, again, if we were sub 500, Marathon would almost win the category, but... TSAR. Yeah, exactly. But the navigator that we've got on the list, the quartz navigator, it's got It's got some some healthy kind of watch nerd credibility to it. It's it's a direct descendant I think probably going back to even the Ben Ruse You know the special ops diver watches from from the Vietnam era up through when Marathon kind of took over from from Ben Ruse and Galet and and it's that asymmetrical case. It's It's a it's a really cool watch. I've wanted one of these for a very long time |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah. And it uses like a, I believe the case is made out of a nylon resin. |
| [Unknown] | Yeah. |
| Jason Heaton | So it's super lightweight. You get one, I believe that, you know, 12 hour bezel and just kind of all around a pretty darn cool watch. Super wearable. I think they look ultra military tritium design. I think those are fun. They are just a hair outside the price point. So if you already have a bunch of stuff that we've talked about, Or you feel 10 bucks isn't too much to stretch. I think that's a pretty interesting one to go for. And they're still kind of making them with a sterile dial. If you really like that military aesthetic, it's hard to kind of beat this look. It doesn't have a spec list that's going to stand up against the Seiko. But I do think they're really cool. I dig that asymmetric, the Benris style case. This would definitely be something I would spend that sort of money on and wear. I just, I think they're really awesome. And I love a 12 hour bezel and I love the tritium. |
| James | Yeah, I do too. Cool. Well, maybe we should finish out with, um, well, we've got our surprise picks, but, uh, the last, the last one that, that I wanted to mention is actually the only Swiss made one on the list. And that's the, the swatch system 51, which kind of was, was a big buzz a few years ago when it came out for being not only for its price, but for a number of other reasons, you know, being, you know, I think the whole movement, it's a mechanical movement, it's, uh, entirely built by machines and it's held together by a single screw. Um, but the price is, is 150 bucks and there's a number of, you know, case colors, dial colors, dial styles. It's, it's never been my kind of personal favorite. I, it's not, you know, that that aesthetic of that watch is not to my taste, but, uh, a lot of people like this watch. A lot of people like Swatch and, you know, I think they're well built and it's, it's a cool watch. If you want something Swiss made for, for 150 bucks, um, system 51 is probably the way to go. |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah, I think I fully agree about the aesthetic. It's not something I would buy and wear, but it's definitely the sort of thing I would buy for someone else and that I recommend to other people. Yeah. Because there's such a wide kind of modern aesthetic to it. Yeah. And tons of colors, more all the time. And they have a couple that are kind of in the vein of a field watch. So if you've got somebody with a little bit more of a practical aesthetic versus some of the ones that are more hyper modern or even kind of astronomy based in their overall kind of dial design. I really love that these exist. Yeah. Um, and, and I would definitely buy a watch with that movement in it. They just haven't really come across one that I look at, you know, outside of kind of novelty. Yeah. I think they're very novel for me. Uh, but they're not, not one that I would buy and actually get much wear out of. You see a lot of kind of like heart, quote unquote, hardcore watch nerds just kind of buying them and keeping them in the plastic, like as a, as a bit of a collector's item, especially when they were brand new or the first time they came to the States, that sort of thing. |
| [Unknown] | Yeah. |
| Jason Heaton | Um, and, and I, I think they're neat and definitely a fantastic watch gift for somebody who's maybe just entering watches or really appreciates the technical attributes of the movement design and the manufacturing, or just somebody who really kind of connects with the aesthetic. Right. Yeah. Certainly cool, uh, to find something Swiss at that price point, no doubt. Yeah. And I think that pretty much, uh, pretty much rounds it up. Now we do have one added element, which is, uh, without telling each other, we each selected, uh, what we believe to be kind of The not the best option, but a really cheap option That is also good. It's maybe something we've experienced ourselves And we didn't tell each other what watch that was so now we each have this kind of Watch and we're gonna see who actually managed to come in at a less at the lesser price point Uh, so jason, do you want to go first or would you like me to go first? |
| James | Because i'm pretty sure I won I'm, pretty sure you did too, but mine's pretty darn cheap. Um Yeah, I'll start. So I, you know, I have kind of a soft spot for this watch because, uh, um, you know, I, I don't come from, from a family that, that had a lot of sort of handed down high-end watches, like, like some people, um. Yeah, me neither. Omegas and things like this. And I, I have some nice old pocket watches from both of my grandfathers, but, uh, the watch that, that I did inherit from my grandfather who passed away, I don't know, you know, several years ago, uh, was just a hand wound, uh, Timex, just a time only, little Timex watch that he used to wear. And the watch that I have picked here is, it looks very similar to it. It's an Arabic dial Timex. It's the Timex Expedition Scout. It is, it's a very military looking watch. It looks like, you know, like one of the kind of the military issue watches from, you know, World War II up through the Vietnam era that Timex produced. It's got the Indiglo luminescence. It's 50 meters water resistant. It comes in kind of a number of different sort of case colors. They have sort of a PVD version. The one I chose is sort of a, it's sort of a matte gray. It's actually a brass case, so I don't know what it's coated with to give it that color. Sort of a gunmetal look. Gunmetal look. It's just a pretty watch. It has a a ticking sweep seconds hand that's in sort of a bright yellow and a small date wheel. There's a 24 hour, uh, sort of military time sub dial or, or, you know, uh, second scale, uh, below the, the, the 12 hour Arabic's, um, kind of sword hands. And it comes in kind of a neat drab, all of nylon straps. So, uh, I found it for sale on target.com. So target stores is selling it for $37 and 49 cents, you know, just, uh, You know, cheaper than probably if I bought this glass of whiskey that I'm sipping here at a high-end bar somewhere, I'd probably pay more for it than for this watch. And it's the kind of watch you could keep in your dop kit and take traveling or, you know, give to a nephew who's graduated from high school or something like that and probably get some pretty good service. Yeah. |
| Jason Heaton | So. What a great choice. I'm not going to get any love for my choice. I think yours is undoubtedly a cooler watch and you actually came really close in price. Mine is $24.73. Oh, wow. And it's this Casio A500WA-1ACF. Oh. And so if you imagine one of these early 80s Casio, or sorry, mid to late 80s Casio digital watches. |
| [Unknown] | Yeah. |
| Jason Heaton | It's that. It's basically this unchanged one. The really basic one I was very tempted to go with is just under $17. Like if you just want time on a bracelet. |
| [Unknown] | Yeah. |
| Jason Heaton | is $17. But recently, a friend of mine came to me, this is a friend of mine that has a Monster and a Techni Sparrowhawk. And he has some nice watches. And he wanted something specifically for travel that would get no attention, but had an alarm and a quick access to another time zone. And very price sensitive, you know, he was traveling through Southeast Asia and up into Japan. |
| [Unknown] | Yeah. |
| Jason Heaton | And what we ended up selecting was this A500WA1ACF. I'm sorry, go to the show notes. It's the best I can offer. It is a 39 millimeter resin case, silver, on a bracelet. I have no idea how they offer a bracelet for that much money. And it has like a day date with the time below it, it's digital. And then in the top right corner, it shows you like a little world. Oh my gosh. And that world has like, an LCD panel above it that gives you where the time zone is. |
| [Unknown] | Yeah. |
| Jason Heaton | So you can cycle through the time zone. It's loosely water resistant. They just say water resistant. They don't say to how much, but it has an LED backlight, which can be really handy if you're at a hostel or somewhere where you don't even want to turn on a flashlight and maybe bother somebody else in the room. |
| [Unknown] | Yeah. |
| Jason Heaton | Up to five daily alarms, also handy. An hourly time signal, one one hundredth of a second chronograph. |
| [Unknown] | Wow. |
| Jason Heaton | And I actually think it looks very inoffensive. And certainly if you, I see this a lot in Vancouver, I think it would depend on the city, but in the last few years, there's been a resurgence of these, of the popularity of these little digital watches, these simple ones. I see a lot of guys in Vancouver wearing the gold one in sort of a hipster way. Yeah. Yeah. They're not expensive and they kind of have a retro charm to them that, that kind of isn't the same retro charm as say a dive watch. |
| [Unknown] | Yeah. |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah. So $25, this watch, easily managed my friend's trip through Asia. And he said it was an absolute tool for him and his girlfriend as they navigated various elements and stayed on time and was able to, you know, track things like the Japanese train system and different things like that. So it was pretty handy, especially when you're outside of maybe data for your phone. And, you know, it gets no attention. It's not the sort of watch that would be stolen from your hotel room if you left it in the hotel room when you went to the pool or something. Yeah, right. And I think these are killer. And at $25, you could actually buy both of our watches for what, like $70, $80? Right, right. I think both are really cool. And I think that's exactly where I would leave the sub $250 price point at this point. I would definitely wear this watch. I like its feature set. And I really like the Timex that you chose. So nicely done with that. |
| James | Yeah, cool. Great place to exit that category. That's awesome. Maybe we'll do a sub $50 category show. |
| Jason Heaton | At that point, we have to buy a bunch of them? Yeah, right. And just try and see which one lasts, like, I don't know, even just a spare. I'll put one on each of my daughter's wrists. Yeah. And see which one's still ticking after a couple of days. Yeah, right. But yeah, so lots of good options there. And I think we really ran the gamut from $25 up to a little over the price point. So if you have any feedback, anything you want to add, any criticisms, by all means, thegrenadoatgmail.com, we're reading every email and we would love your input. And like I said, if we can amass enough of a new list of watches that TGN listeners love, I'd more than happily address this topic again. Because I think it's such a rich price point. It's something accessible and there's lots clearly there's lots here There's lots of stuff that we didn't get to All right, you want to think final notes kind of put a bow on it? |
| James | Yeah, let's do it Yeah, so I've got a bit of a confession to make I've been kind of a nerdy fan of a very arcane I don't know how to describe it. It's a It's sort of a tradition in England and it's called the shipping forecast. And the shipping forecast is, as it sounds, it's something that's broadcast on BBC radio for three or four times a day. And it comes through their Met service or the meteorological office. And it was devised I think back in the 1930s or 40s as a service to fishermen and boat captains who were out in the waters around Great Britain, which of course is an island nation. And so it's very closely tied to the ocean. And, uh, basically what it is is it's, um, the, the radio announcer comes on at these set times during the day and night and reads off the meteorological data for the different ocean category or ocean regions around the Great Britain. And these ocean regions have very evocative sort of names. Um, Forth and Tyne and Dogger and German Byte and you know they have all these really evocative sounding names and then they sort of list off these names and after each name they give the barometric pressure and the kind of the wind category speed and kind of the current conditions and it has almost this sort of meditative poetic sort of cadence to it that they read it. And I've just found it sort of mesmerizing to listen to. And the BBC website, actually, there's such a following for this. I think there are a lot of Brits that kind of feel this real kinship or real sort of attachment to the shipping forecast because parents and grandparents kind of grew up hearing this on the radio. And to me, it always kind of conjures up this idea of, you know, being out kind of in a dark sailboat, kind of bobbing offshore somewhere, wondering if there's a storm coming and maybe you're heating up a bowl of soup while you're, you know, bobbing in the dark somewhere. And you hear this come on the radio and the BBC kind of is tapped into that. And they actually provide back episodes, you know, recorded back episodes of the shipping forecast and you could just play them on demand. And I do this fairly regularly, especially if I'm like when you were in Basel, if I'm lying awake with jet lag and I'm trying to go to sleep, I'll just stream. an episode of the Shipping Forecast and they're like anywhere between 8 and 15 minutes so a lot of times it's enough to kind of put you to sleep and then oftentimes in the last one that they do in the evenings they'll play this sort of piece of classical music that sort of leads into the Shipping Forecast and then after it's over they play the National Anthem, the British National Anthem and it kind of fades out from there. I've just always kind of found that it kind of really appeals to my sense of history and love of all things kind of nautical and maritime. And I guess I, this is kind of a long preamble to, to kind of the real final note that I wanted to mention, which was an article in the Atlantic, uh, or on their website, the Atlantic magazine's website called the men who chased shipwrecks. And it was an article about this, this family of men by the name of Gibson who lived in a certain region of England, uh, in Cornwall on the sea. And whenever there was a shipwreck that they would hear about on the radio, um, they would grab their cameras and they would rush out to, you know, the shoreline, wherever the ship had run aground. And they would take these beautiful black and white, um, kind of large format photos of the, of the shipwrecks. And they've produced some amazing images, uh, over the years dating back to, I don't know, like the early 1900s and really amazing stuff. And so we'll put a link up to this article about it, but there was also a, a recent auction in which the original sort of photography that these guys took from the early 1900s all the way up through the 1980s were being auctioned off. And it's very haunting photography. It's beautiful in sort of a macabre sort of way because these are black and white photos of ships that have run aground and are kind of awash and men being rescued. And I just think between that and the shipping forecast, I just It sort of conjures up this, a lot of things that appeal to me about, you know, shipwrecks in the ocean and kind of maritime culture. And so those are kind of my first two lead-ins here for Final Notes. |
| Jason Heaton | Very cool. The photos are just fantastic. Yeah. Yeah. So it's definitely worth reading the article even just to get some context for these photos. I mean, they're just the corpses of ships basically on the rocks in bad water. and very dramatic and you wouldn't believe that it's, you know, well over a hundred years old. A lot of the images they have in that, in the article. Fantastic. |
| [Unknown] | Yeah. |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah. So my first for the episode is, uh, is actually a purchase that I made recently that was better than I expected. And I think it's kind of a, uh, a fitting time of year to talk about some of the adventuring gear that isn't watches or bags. But so in this case, it's a pair of pants. And so I recently bought, uh, I, I had kind of wanted them for a while. They're the, uh, the Eddie Bauer Guide Pro Pants. And I know you have a pair, and I think that's kind of where I saw them, and you may have multiple pairs, I'm not sure, but I picked up a pair of these and I was expecting them to be kind of very similar to the kind of multi-use climbing pants I have from Patagonia. |
| [Unknown] | Yeah. |
| Jason Heaton | And they are very similar, but it's just kind of a different layout as far as the pockets. So there's a pocket on each thigh, And they're kind of like a tan material. They call the color saddle and they're drastically less expensive than the Patagonia ones. Currently on the website, you can get the Guide Pro Pants for under $50 in the States. Amazing. And I paid, uh, they were a hundred Canadian, but 40% off. So not, not a ton of money either. And I wore them around for the day that I bought them. And I absolutely love them. They're not heavy, they dry. almost instantaneously. The pocket layout is really nice. The zippers are good on the thigh pockets and the back uses like a simple Velcro to kind of secure whatever's in the pocket without having to deal with a full zipper. And yeah, as an alternative to some of the more expensive options from a Patagonia or an Arterix, I think these are killer and they're certainly a price point where you're not going to feel precious about them. Right. So if you're looking at gearing up for some travel, Or some hiking, camping, adventuring, that sort of thing. These are definitely would make a fine layer under a dry suit. These are the sort of pants I wear kind of all the time on the weekend. And yeah, I'm absolutely thrilled. I can keep this one really short. You should definitely buy a pair. And if you're in the States, all the easier because the Eddie Bauer stuff's even cheaper there. |
| James | Yeah, I think this totally gets the TGN stamp of approval from both of us. I love them as travel pants. They're great on an airplane. The thigh pocket's perfect for like a passport or your phone. I've got, I don't know, they've got a kind of a slightly less techy version that just has kind of one thigh pocket and it's a little bit more, it's a slightly different cut and I've actually worn it with a sport jacket and a pair of, you know, decent looking shoes and you can kind of get away with it. It's a great, great, great clothing option. |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah, they make quite a few different pairs of pants and I would say the only thing that gives away the Guide Pro Pants as being like even more casual than a pair of jeans, depending on your scenario, is they have that First Ascent logo just kind of above the knee on the left leg. So, I mean, that kind of gives them away as sportswear. But while I was at the store, they have a handful of other models that use a similar material, this super light DWR coated material. that didn't have any thigh pockets and just kind of wore like regular chinos and actually were fairly slim through the leg. They weren't all like billowy and blowy like a pair of Tearaways. Right. Yeah, I was just impressed. I mean, I always like Eddie Bauer stuff because it's a really nice mix of price and performance and they have a great warranty. But even this stuff kind of outweighed my expectations and it'll be kind of my core travel stuff for Clipperton. I think it'll work really well for that. Yeah, I think so too. So what else do you got? |
| James | Yeah, I'll finish up with just a quick one, you know, cause we've talked about the movie, uh, blue water, white death. We brought it up earlier in the show. Um, I, you know, I love that movie so much. You do too. Um, I, I found, I was just trolling around on iTunes the other day and I found it on iTunes. Um, I actually bought it on iTunes for $5.99 in HD and, uh, fantastic. It's, you know, it's, it's awesome. Cause the only way, other way I had watched that was like streaming it off of YouTube, kind of poor quality. And, uh, it's, it's even better in HD and, and now I can just watch it anytime I want, skip ahead through different sections of the movie. And, uh, anyway, I'm not going to go into too much detail cause we've, we've talked about this movie quite a bit in past episodes and, uh, definitely, um, worth getting on, on iTunes if you're, if you're into that. |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah. And I just bought the book, uh, based on the same story. So I'll be reading that on, uh, on Clipperton as, as something to kind of kill some of the non-internet time. I don't know what. somebody does without internet for that long, but I guess we'll find out. I'll read a bunch of books. And then, yeah, my final is actually a really excellent long read from The Guardian. Jason, you and I are fairly obsessed with Patagonia because of their founder, Yvon Chouinard, and we've obviously talked about various interviews that he's given in the past. He has a fantastic one for How I Made This with NPR. But this is a long read, a very long article, which I love. I love a good long article called Patagonia and the North Face Saving the World, One Puffer Jacket at a Time. So obviously in the last couple of years, the kind of puffy pillow jackets, the down jackets have become vogue again. Who knows how long that lasts, but it is very much a kind of trend in outerwear right now. And they make such a widely used jacket, but obviously there's drastically different standards to which they're made and how environmental their construction is. And this is a really fantastic look at kind of not only the similarities between North Face and Patagonia, but the differences in their approach to business, one being publicly traded, one being private. And if you're interested in this sort of thing, and there's a lot of like, it's a bit of a tumultuous time for the outerwear industry. as they're now siding against governments in various states and abandoning shows. And it's a fun story to see like the history, the kind of rebellious history of some of these brands that are still doing rebellious things today, many, many years later when they could just take all your money. And certainly their businesses, they want to make your money. But, you know, I love reading these things. And both the North Face and Patagonia have these fantastic origin stories. And it's this very well-written piece. So swing by the show notes and check that out. I had a blast reading it. And, uh, I like these sorts of, uh, big articles. And it's about a topic that I think falls squarely into the, uh, TGN mind space. Definitely. Awesome. And I think that pretty much wraps it up. So as always, thanks so much for listening, hit the show notes for more details. You can follow us on Instagram at Jason Heaton. I'm at J E Stacy, and you can follow the show at the gray NATO. If you have any questions for us, please write TheGreyNado at gmail.com and please subscribe and review wherever you find your podcasts or you can grab the feed from TheGreyNado.com as well. Music throughout is Siesta by Jazzer via the free music archive. |
| James | Until next time we leave you with this quote from Cyril Connolly. We must select the illusion which appeals to our temperament and embrace it with passion if we want to be happy. |