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Sailing – GPS
GPS (Global Positioning System) technology has boomed ahead over the past few years and for a couple of hundred dollars, you can have a lovely little GPS system in the palm of your hand. What more do you need other than a sail boat and your GPS?
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The fact is, you need a lot more. You will still need your charts and the ability to read them. You will need to know the buoy system. You need to know where you are, where you are going, and how you plan to get there.
The GPS system is a wonderful addition to your charting. You can look at your charts, plug in the information and set your course. However, before you do that, ask yourself this question:
If I am heading to 44.5°N 55°W to 44°N 59°W then due north to 47°N 59°W to 46°N 55°W then due south to 44.5°N 55°W, where am I? If this is all nonsense to you, you will have to work on your charting for a while. (Hint: You’re heading to Banquereau Bank south of Newfoundland.)
If you have been sailing for a while, you will likely be accomplished at charting and reading the buoys. In this case, you can concentrate on learning the GPS system. The first lesson you will learn is to carry lots of batteries with you – the last thing you need to do is have the GPS quit on you. This happened to my sailing buddy, Fitz. He was out in the Atlantic off a point that he knew very well and had set his course using the GPS. Then, it quit on him. He had not done manual charting and suddenly there he was in water that should have been familiar but when you are entirely surrounded by water, familiar or not, it all looks pretty much the same.
He sailed straight ahead until he could see land and he recognized the lighthouse. It was not the lighthouse he expected to see but it was one that he recognized and he sailed to safety.
Fitz offered another piece of advice – play with the GPS until you learn to trust it and your reading of it. Another day, out in the Atlantic again, the fog came up. Fitz began to sail for his home point again. He was using the GPS to guide him but he felt that he was actually a lot closer to the point than the GPS indicated and he did not trust it. He’d been sailing out in that area for years and he thought was that his experience was more accurate than the GPS and he ignored the GPS until he realized that the lighthouse was not where he expected it to be and he was left with no recourse but to trust his GPS which did guide him right to home base.
Fitz says these days, even in spite of carrying extra batteries for his GPS and having learned to trust it, he has also kept a manual chart as well. Sometimes the GPS can fail for non-battery related reasons and after his experience trusting his instincts, he wants to know exactly where he is.......
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