On Thu, 24 Nov 2011 07:12:17 -0800 (PST), Tim
wrote:

One year the wife gave me the local Blue Charts for my new Garmin
Map60 CX.
I still use them... even playing with the charts on my home computer
planning destinations.

Now, I an understand that... Something practical and useful.

===

Very practical and very useful, especially in the off season. It can
also be done for free on a home PC, and very inexpensively on a boat.
All of the US charts can be downloaded at no cost on the NOAA site:

http://www.charts.noaa.gov/

Tim, you will need the S-57 ENC charts for the inland rivers.

A very capable software charting program is available for free he

http://opencpn.org/drupal/download

All you need to turn that combo into an inexpensive chartplotter for a
boat is a $30 USB GPS device, a laptop computer and an inexpensive
power inverter.

http://www.amazon.com/USGlobalSat-BU-353-WaterProof-Enabled-Receiver/dp/B000V5TV22

http://www.amazon.com/Power-Bright-PW400-12-Inverter-Watt/dp/B000OOZY5S

Unfortunately our Canadian friends still have to pay for their
electronic charts.