Roberto
Well-known member
Sometimes we sail in uncharted waters (mainly rivers o river entrances), that means that at times I have to anchor the boat, take the dinghy with the lead sounder to find a path where the 2m draught could pass, then back to the boat and there we go trying our luck.
Sometimes one finds useful conspicuous points, more often all the trees look the same, no indents on the shoreline, etc etc so all relies on memory.
I once brought on the dinghy our little handheld GPS, an old MLR with a 3x6cm very basic screen, recorded the track while on the dinghy, but once back to the boat the screen was too tiny and with too low a number of pixels to give any useful precision, at whatever zoom level, and if I put it in "track mode" then it would record the new track being made over the first one, which then creates too much confusion on the way back.
So, I'd need a handheld GPS (that is with disposable/rechargeable batteries), watertight/weathertight, capable of recording a track, displaying the same track again while *not* recording the second track, with the best possible level of precision in the repetition, the highest "density" of pixels.
Another option might be to have the possibility of putting a sequence of "marks", a bit like waypoints but I need with a lot quicker method (no time to insert lat long while in the dinghy); a sort of repeated "MOB" instruction: one goes here and there with the dinghy, recording instantly coordinates of suitable waypoints. MOB1, MOB2, etc, then back on the boat one follows the succession. Again, it should be possible to zoom in at the highest possible level.
Absolutely no need to have charts (most of the times they do not exist or show us sailing in the middle of the countryside), just the very best display of the track, at high zoom.
I suppose if one records a track at time t, and uses it again at time t+10minutes with the same instrument, the satellites might be in a very similar position so hopefully the error would be minimized (?).
It might also be possible to transfer the portable gps track/wp to the PC (we have OpenCpn with a USB GPS), but I fear unsing a different GPS might introduce additional errors (?).
Any suggestions (apart from 'remain where you have charts') about possible handheld GPS models which might be suitable ?
A moment of saudade, here we were on a friends' cat, on our blog there is a satellite picture of the place plus tracks shown on "charts"
http://sybrancaleone.blogspot.com/2011/06/cascata-di-tremembe.html
ah and no, buying a cat is not something we would do
Sometimes one finds useful conspicuous points, more often all the trees look the same, no indents on the shoreline, etc etc so all relies on memory.
I once brought on the dinghy our little handheld GPS, an old MLR with a 3x6cm very basic screen, recorded the track while on the dinghy, but once back to the boat the screen was too tiny and with too low a number of pixels to give any useful precision, at whatever zoom level, and if I put it in "track mode" then it would record the new track being made over the first one, which then creates too much confusion on the way back.
So, I'd need a handheld GPS (that is with disposable/rechargeable batteries), watertight/weathertight, capable of recording a track, displaying the same track again while *not* recording the second track, with the best possible level of precision in the repetition, the highest "density" of pixels.
Another option might be to have the possibility of putting a sequence of "marks", a bit like waypoints but I need with a lot quicker method (no time to insert lat long while in the dinghy); a sort of repeated "MOB" instruction: one goes here and there with the dinghy, recording instantly coordinates of suitable waypoints. MOB1, MOB2, etc, then back on the boat one follows the succession. Again, it should be possible to zoom in at the highest possible level.
Absolutely no need to have charts (most of the times they do not exist or show us sailing in the middle of the countryside), just the very best display of the track, at high zoom.
I suppose if one records a track at time t, and uses it again at time t+10minutes with the same instrument, the satellites might be in a very similar position so hopefully the error would be minimized (?).
It might also be possible to transfer the portable gps track/wp to the PC (we have OpenCpn with a USB GPS), but I fear unsing a different GPS might introduce additional errors (?).
Any suggestions (apart from 'remain where you have charts') about possible handheld GPS models which might be suitable ?
A moment of saudade, here we were on a friends' cat, on our blog there is a satellite picture of the place plus tracks shown on "charts"
http://sybrancaleone.blogspot.com/2011/06/cascata-di-tremembe.html
ah and no, buying a cat is not something we would do