The search for the perfect audio tool | a use case scenario

We are field naturalists and we enjoy guided tours when we travel. We know first hand that there is no replacement for the richness of a guided experience with a real person. Nothing beats an interpreters gestures, expressions and enthusiasm. Storytelling on the spot, identifying a new orchid along the trail or fielding questions when the gorillas decide to spar. But even the best of us can't be everywhere to  provide the services our site might need; the ability to speak several languages, to audio describe the exhibits or maps, to make the vocalization of every wood warbler we might encounter. So we search for tools and technologies that best fit each use case. Tools that we can use to enrich the visitor experience, not complicate it. Tools that function as an extension of the interpreter. Not just techology for technologies sake. 
Here is the Lake Ledge story of that search for the perfect audio tool:

Once upon a time

Lake Ledge was looking for an audio solution during the development of an accessible nature trail. We wanted to offer audio description, bird vocalization and first person narrative to accompany the interpretive panels. The trail was in a wilderness park. We didn't have thousands of dollars to spend. Cell phone access- sometimes. No outlets of course. Nobody wanted to add pushbuttons (we could only afford to add buttons to one of the seven panels) and to stick a battery and wires in the woods just shouted "maintenance" and somehow soured the concept of wilderness. We like screens and smartphones but they didn't fit this project. And quite frankly we wanted people to put their devices in their pockets on this trail, to experience the forest. To talk with one another while immersed in the experience. And then there it was a hand held audio technology from a publishing house across the pond in the United Kingdom. A tool that was used to sound enable books for language learning to audio label canned goods for the blind and to identify birdsong! This was it. A simple, afforable, interactive tool that played high quality audio.Why can't we use it on a trail, we thought. So we called and a collaboration emerged. Our collaboration has since created many more projects and Lake Ledge has become the US distributer. Now the field has an affordable solution driven by interpretation not by technology. The beginning.