Da Kine wrote:
Maybe I am misreading - GPS is not the only tool you need and it seems
that you are saying it is. Also, that little lightning detector that's
being sold is nothing more then an RDF with no other features.

I'm not tryiing to start a brawl here, I just see people thinking to
highly of GPS. The funniest thing is that most of the charts for other
parts of the world are not nearly accurate enough to even think GPS.
There are island groups on Caribbean charts with notes like "last
survey by captain so and so of the English admiralty 1841 - No chart
datum can fix that chart. Este sud Este is about 4 miles off of the
chart position and none of the little islands are in the same place or
the same shape as on the chart. Half moon key (cayo media luna)
isn't even there anymore, there is an atoll where it use to be (but
it is still on the charts.

The point is, if you don't KNOW how to navigate you're likely to
trust the wrong thing or not trust the right thing. If you know how to
really navigate - read waves, understand currents, read clouds, know
weather, do dead reckoning, keep a log, triangulate, use a sextant -
You'll need the old tools to do time honored navigation. GPS is a great
tool as long as it works and as long as the charts are accurate (which
they aren't and which get worse as you get further away from places
people frequent - like where most people like to cruise). GPS is
great if it doesn't run you aground on the reef that was suppose to
be 4 miles away!

As for RDF - I think anyone sailing in a tropical area should have
one for the one time they need to see the direction of a lightning
storm. I also think everyone there needs a sextant and knowledge of how
to do triangulation so they can keep track of a distant storms movement
with bass height (which requires weather knowledge). I think that
anyone stuck in a problem concerning those things that has not learned
what they should know and has left sight of land without the right
tools is asking for trouble.

Tell mw how you fix your position on a chart, surveyed in 1841, without
a known datum, using waves, clouds and a sextant?