my own opinion is that compasses and barometers are best not fitted to gps units purely because the casio protrek watches do the same thing and use much much less battery power and it's best not to put all your navigation egges in 1 basket... as an expat nzer i know that a new garmin gps76s is pretty expensive in nz, but you could do something like buy a 2nd hand etrex venture, legend from ebay usa and with the savings get a new triple sensor protrek... eric e lurker... *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List - Any opinions or suggestions expressed here are solely those of the writer(s). You must assume the entire responsibility for reliance upon them. All postings copyright the author. Submissions: PaddleWise_at_PaddleWise.net Subscriptions: PaddleWise-request_at_PaddleWise.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************
Thanks for all the comment and advice on the gps replacement. I probably should have been a bit more forthcoming on what sort of use it was going to get. Our double kayak is equipped with a large Silva 85 steering compass mounted in front of my cockpit. We have digital maps covering all of New Zealand (1:50,000), and print off and laminate coverage for trips as required. With the maps under bungies in front of me, plus the easily read compass, our normal navigational requirements are met. The GPS, along with the EPIRB and cellphone are kept in plastic containers down a hatch, and would only come out for an emergency. The GPS 38 actually looks brand new. The interest in a replacement with a compass is for mountain biking in the situation where you come to a fork in the track. Your map doesn't show it, so you check your position with the gps, then check the bearing of each fork before deciding which is more likely to be the one you want. Eventually you probably find you got it wrong, but hey, at least you tried. The comments on the size of numbers in the display of various models were especially welcome. I wear glasses to correct short sight, and don't want to have to remove them to read the display (and I have tried and rejected progressive lenses). Allan Singleton Hamilton NZ *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List - Any opinions or suggestions expressed here are solely those of the writer(s). You must assume the entire responsibility for reliance upon them. All postings copyright the author. Submissions: PaddleWise_at_PaddleWise.net Subscriptions: PaddleWise-request_at_PaddleWise.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************
>From: Allan & Joyce Singleton <alsjfs_at_paradise.net.nz> >Subject: RE: [Paddlewise] gps replacement > >Thanks for all the comment and advice on the gps replacement. > >The interest in a replacement with a compass is for mountain biking in >the situation where you come to a fork in the track. Your map doesn't >show it, so you check your position with the gps, then check the bearing >of each fork before deciding which is more likely to be the one you >want. Eventually you probably find you got it wrong, but hey, at least >you tried. > I would opt for a slightly different approach. Most Garmin GPS models these days provide for 10 tracklogs that can be saved in memory in addition to the active log that is recording where you go. The 10 'Saved Tracks' can either be created by saving an existing track on your GPS or you can upload them from your PC using maps of the area (OziExplorer is a good program that supports this for a wide variety of computer and/or scanned paper maps). Doing the latter allows you to upload all the trails in the area of your planned bike ride/hike/etc. and see them displayed on the 'Map Page' of your GPS. Then when you get to that fork in the road you just glance at the screen, see on which trail you've been travelling and in which direction it continues. Usually there's no need for translating a GPS position reading to your paper map or any need for compass bearings. If you do make a mistaken turn it'll show up almost immediately as the cursor showing your position starts to deviate from the line on the screen showing the trail you planned to follow. Note that this method works fine even for units like the basic eTrex that do not support downloading maps - all current Garmin/Magellan/Lowrance models do support downloading tracklogs (although Magellans only support one tracklog at a time). Unless you want downloadable maps (I'm not familiar with what's available yet for New Zealand), I'd recommend one of the rather basic models with multiple saved tracks; e.g. the yellow eTrex or Geko 201. But the Silva/Brunton MNS is one model that doesn't show you the tracklog on the display or support uploading tracklogs representing the trails in the area. I'd strongly recommend avoiding this particular model. Their claimed long battery life is also rather deceptive. It's based on the assumption that you'll be taking your GPS out every hour or so, turn it on for a few seconds to get a compass reading, and then turn it off again. Doing so will of course let the batteries last for many days, but the same would be true of any other unit as well. *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List - Any opinions or suggestions expressed here are solely those of the writer(s). You must assume the entire responsibility for reliance upon them. All postings copyright the author. Submissions: PaddleWise_at_PaddleWise.net Subscriptions: PaddleWise-request_at_PaddleWise.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************
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