I hope everybody had a great Christmas and let's all hope for a peaceful and prosperous New Year.

Santa (could have been my parents) left me a Garmin etrex Venture handheld GPS.
http://www.garmin.com/products/etrexVenture/

I can hardly wait to use it on the boat rather than walking around the neighborhood with it.

I'd like to know if anyone has any suggestions of where to mount it. I'm thinking of putting it in a Zip-lock bag and strapping it horizontally to the windward side-seat. That way I can look down and read it with relative ease. (I hope) Should I put a box around it so it doesn't get beat up?

My other question is; IS it worth me buying a CD-Rom so I can download charts (no water depths) into it?

Thanks for your help

I'm having a lot of fun with it so far. I haven't taken waypoints of the neighbors houses and trees but I did "punch-in" some local pubs and the neighborhood liquor store.

I was also considering mounting the unit on the CB Trunk but thought it may be a bit difficult to read in rough weather and, sheets or my feet could hit it. And as Don pointed out I want it to be in safe, dry place unobstructed place.

Don. I don't have a Halifax Harbour chart but was wondering if you have waypoints for such places as McNab's Island Lighthouse, Thrumcap buoy, Ives Knoll, Halifax Charlie, Bravo and Alpha, Chedabucto head etc.? Is there a place on the net that can give me that info?

Thanks that would be a great help!!!

Thanks a lot. This is precisely the site I was hoping for.

posted December 30, 2002 11:06 AM            

Hope you all had an enjoyable Christmas and are looking forward to the new year (new year, new sailing season! 2 and a half months till my season starts!) as much as I am.

I once thought about mounting a GPS and I was thinking of using some kind of velcro system so that I could bring the GPS with me to the windward side. There was also a swivel mount available for most GPS' at the time. I thought this could be used to mount the GPS on the c/b trunk and then I could swivel the unit to get a good view of it.

I even thought of mounting a projector on either gunwale and then "projecting" the GPS onto my mainsail... ok so I didn't really think of that. But if CL ever did a R&D on GPS mounting I would be sure to give it a shot.

Getting bored here in the office so I thought I would chime in. I'll be int he chat if anyone is interested.

Regards

Now, down to business. I am a man with very little money, therefore, I cannot buy sophistication as Robert's GPS, I must rely on the old compass system. Problem is, I don't know it.
Any help with this would be of great help.
I would also like to know if there are any sites with nautical maps of small, unknown lakes (I had to use Alta Vista for the map alone, the little thing it gives is too bloody small so I had to sketch 6 or 7 of them on to one big piece of paper, I'll get around to problems with that later) as I was unable to find any (Alta Vista didn't give one.

Give the Coast Guard a try. They may be able to help you. If they placed buoys, bacons etc. on the lakes your speaking of, there should be a chart for it. It's a shot in the dark but better than no shot at all. In any event I'm sure they can help lead you in the right direction.

Here is a site I found that may be of some use to you. I hope it will help you.
http://www.maptown.com/

posted January 23, 2003 03:13 PM            

quote:

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Originally posted by Canadian Sailor:
I live in Ontario, the only possible place I can of to get the maps would be the CYA, but they probably only have ones of Lake Ontario.

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posted January 27, 2003 01:58 PM            

We use a Garmin GPS 48 in our Sandpiper. Certainly more mounting options than in your boat but just wanted to say that these things can receive satellite signals perfectly well when mounted inside a fibreglass hull. Don't worry so much about it being able to see the sky......just make it visible to the helm position and try to keep it out of harms way from sailor's feet and stray loops of sheets etc. Garmin has lots of accessories including a marine mount. Ours seems spray-proof enough and it's mounted in the cockpit in all but rainy weather. Here's the marine mount.
http://shop.garmin.com/accessory.jsp?sku=010%2D10354%2D00

An external DC power source (small motorcycle battery?) would give you power for navigation lights and your GPS as well.
A combined DC power/data cable will provide DC power to your unit.
http://shop.garmin.com/accessory.jsp?sku=010%2D10268%2D00

Having owned and used my Garmin GPS since 1999 I can tell you that their area of pre-programmed or down-loadable navigation aids is limited to the U.S.A. only. Lot's of help if you sail on Lake Ontario near the mouth of the Niagara River, but useless elsewhere.

Your GPS has the new WAAS option, so it has the capability of giving you a position accuracy to less than three meters {when receiving WAAS corrections.}

We set a course on the paper chart at home, transfer the waypoints into the GPS and it simply tells us which direction to steer and how long it will take to get there. It's quite useful to determine which tack is closer to the course rumb line.

Thanks for the info about downloading charts. Right now I don't have any plans to sail in U.S. waters but that could easily change. However the website that Don provided me, in this thread, has been a monumental help to me. In fact I've been able to get plot my courses in N.S. from my computer in Alberta!!

Your mention of cables is most intriguing to me. I didn't consider using the cables for the GPS because I thought I'd rely on keeping a lot of batteries for spares but I have contemplated putting running lights on. At present I use a coat hanger, shaped into a loop, that is attached to the bowplate. The original purpose of this little bowsprit was to catch the spinnaker sheets so they don't go underneath the hull. However this bowsprit also holds my nav light in place as well. (My nav light is one of those flashlight units whose lense is green and red.) The only problem with that though is the light is low to the water thus I'm not sure how visible I really am. A mast head light would help solve the problem, but I never really knew how I'd install one on a CL 16. If the motorcycle battery you mention is compact enough, I might be able to get a masthead light afterall.

Robert
Celtic Kiss #2120

I bought the external power cable at
$ 30.00 for my Magellan 315 so I could use it in the car (cigarette adaptor) or on the Mirage 33.
I should have bought the combination power/data cable at $ 50.00
I see there is a software upgrade for the 315 and now I can't download and transfer to the gps. d'oh!