Which Navigation Program Do You Use?

[GordMay]

I've often* felt comfortable with "eyeball" piloting - reading the water depths.
*I have rarely been in murky water, where I couldn't see a thinfg.

[Pblais]

I've often* felt comfortable with "eyeball" piloting - reading the water depths.

Actually a pretty reliable method in the places where the water is clear and it's sunny. In coral it's better than charts. Water color can be a good eye ball navigation tool.

Here on the Chesapeake where you can see the bottom they call it "land".

[cat man do]

I'm comfortable enough as well and you can see in those Google earth pics that there is a ton of space between the individual reef, but it would be pretty easy to get lost in there especially if you had to get out in the afternoon with the sun in your eyes.

Obviously why the edges onl ever get looked at.

This is why we want to go

http://www.kanimblacharters.net.au/boats.php

Dave

[yotphix]

I remember a story in Cruising World a while back about a guy using a GPS,depth finder and a jet ski in the Bahamas to make accurate charts of the reefs in the Bahamas where the standard fare is not as good as your eyes. This was a commercial venture IIRC and expected at the time to be successful. Perhaps a new venture for you?

[cat man do]

Someone had done a hand drawn chart of atolls around the edges years ago using similar method, but it appears that we can't get them anymore as the guy has died and no one stocks them anymore.

Wish i'd grabbed 'em 5 years ago when I first heard of them.

Dave

[GordMay]

Originally Posted by Pblais

... Here on the Chesapeake where you can see the bottom they call "land".

Nice turn of phrase not only humourous, but accurate - the same would apply to Lk. Superior.

[Tnflakbait]

Oziexplorer is really cheap (about 90$) and it works great. download it from their website.

[Pblais]

the same would apply to Lk. Superior.

For exactly the same but opposite reason. Here we have no depth but the water is muddy and on Lk. Superior there is a surpluss of depth so you never do see bottom that often. My favoite Great Lake for sure. Spent a lot of time on the MN North shore but never sailed there.

[cat man do]

Sick of seeing Pauls name come up on this Ghost Post with no actual post

Maybe now I won't look at it every day thinking there is an answer to my problems.

All you Wallys that keep voting yet not posting, don't be shy.......... we're nice guy's , really we are, say something pleeeaase.

Dave

[beau]

Dave,
I lived in Cairns and Townsville for many years. We had no GPS in those days. It was doubtfull whether we ever found the same fishing spot twice.

What we did, was charter a light plane on a good day (no cloud) with a low tide over the reef.
We would take lots of photos of the reefs we were trying to fish from.

Getting into the reef is not aways a big problem but getting out can be difficult if cloud comes over and makes visibility difficult. A shallow draft is essential. (multihull).
One thing we did find is that the best fishing is usually on the outside edge of the reef.
What about Gbrmpa (Great Barrier Reef marine park authority) based in Townsville. They must have good aerial photos.

[Ben Goodwin]

Hi all, finally joined so I can join in...
I use Digiboat. Love the C-Map charts, and SOB is fast, easy and seems to always have more features/abilities than I ask it for!

Dave,
If I've done it right, here are screenshots from c-map/sob for your area (lat/lng on the statusbar, lower-left corner will indicate the are shown, also I reduced colours to 256 for GIF file, so some colours may be different, but the detail is the same, the overview shot shows borders around areas with more detailed charts):

[Ben Goodwin]

Dave,
Pasting them obviously didn't work...
This time I tried attaching.

Hope this works.
BGood

[cat man do]

Thanks for that Ben, they work quite well, especially around Fred's and Saumaurez.

Can the same detail be achieved in the Swains area or is that as good as it gets, and if it is, how big would your boat image look on the chart.

Just tring to get an idea as to whether you could use it for getting out in the dark if you had to if say you were in behind Horsehoe reef for the night and a dark N/Westerly picked up.

Beau, don't know if grumpa have pic's or not, but would prefere not to use that method in this day and age, or this size boat that far offshore.

I don't feel quite that adventurous.

Dave

[Ben Goodwin]

Dave,

I'll get another screenshot as soon as Norton gives me back my computer. Its Sunday morning virus scan is taking far longer than usual today! Necessary evil I guess - but the only reason I use it is because its acronym is NAV!

Ben.

[Ben Goodwin]

Dave,

I've blown-up Horseshoe reef - not quite enough to show the ship scaled shape, so I put a 500m marker on it for reference. I'd say this is not really enough detailed for safe navigating, but while you're there you can of course place your own chart marks showing depths, obstructions etc.

The other two images give an idea that if any area is surveyed at more detail, it will be shown (Hydrographer's Channel). The final image shows this in overview with the detailed area's borders clearly showing what's available.
The final pic is a perspective view (with a NE marker line) which also gives an overview of the area with borders around those places with more detailed coverage.

I should say that the chart I've got for this area is a few years old, it's an NT+ chart, not the newer MAX chart. I do know that a lot of the QLD areas have better detail in newer C-Map MAX charts - but I don't know if it is better in your area of interest???

Hope this helps!
Ben.