>JCMARTIN43_at_aol.com wrote: > > But do I need the map capability? Dave K. said: >Don't think you need maps, necessarily, but you will need pre-planned >waypoints >for some trips. Hummm, Whether or not your GPS has electronic charts, I think it's still a good idea to carry "hardcopy" charts. The GPS can fail due to battery discharge, compartment flooding, destruction of the GPS satillites by invading UFOs, etc. etc. and if it goes, there go your charts, making your compass (you ARE carrying a compass, right?) much less useful. The advantage I see to built-in charts is that your position is plotted for you, letting you easily see your relationship to rocks, landing places, etc. - it's not always easy transferring lat. and long. numbers from my GPS readout to a paper chart, especially in lively seas. The downsides I see to GPS charts are the aforementioned risk of failure, plus that, by their very nature, the display screens of pocket GPSs are small and don't give you the big picture as readily as paper charts do. Peering constantly at a tiny screen in bouncy water sounds like a recipe for sea-sickness to me. I usually get a magnetic bearing from my GPS, then use my deck compass to follow it. The deck compass is mounted fairly near my bow, so I don't have to look down or change my focus as radically as I do to read the GPS. You might be surprised at how much difference this makes to my ongoing "situational awareness"; the forward-mounted compass is sort of my low-tech version of the fighter-pilot's "Heads-Up Display":-) Philip Torrens N49°16' W123°06' *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List - All postings copyright the author and not to be reproduced outside PaddleWise without author's permission Submissions: paddlewise_at_lists.intelenet.net Subscriptions: paddlewise-request_at_lists.intelenet.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************Received on Tue Apr 04 2000 - 08:36:09 PDT
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