For places that do not need
major chart adjustment, OziExplorer can read other raster charts like
Maptech, NOS-GEO, and BSB charts, or charts you've scanned yourself. For places where you'd like a little
more graphical detail, it can also read NASA Landsat
Satellite Photos (from
https://zulu.ssc.nasa.gov/mrsid/)
which are geo-referenced in UTM/WGS 84 projection. These are very
helpful when comparing charts for accuracy, or looking for unconventional anchorages within uncharted lagoons.
Even with Satellite calibrated charts, on a crystal clear day, with the sun
overhead, you’ll find me standing on the bow!! Your eyes are the only
thing that you can truly depend on. Once we anchor I download
the track to Oziexplorer and adjust the waypoints along the route we
just came in as needed. I then upload the adjusted waypoints/routes back to
the GPS, and the track and waypoints/routes to a spare GPS.
Try to
get comfortable navigating using your GPS track,
someday it may save your boat if you need to escape an anchorage at
night or in poor conditions. We know of a boat (Opus IV) that sailed
for 8 years in Fiji during cyclone season. They needed to be able to get
anywhere at anytime in case a cyclone popped up. They we very
comfortable navigating using their GPS tracks, and had an entire
collection saved for all of Fiji. One day they we in Viani Bay and a
diver came in with "the bends" after
dark. No other boat felt comfortable leaving the anchorage after dark,
but since Opus IV had a proven, saved track they were able to bring him
to a doctor, most likely saved his life.
If you aren’t into creating your own charts and want to
stick with CMAP charts, MaxSea will read them and allows you to save the
track to a separate file, but CMAP as a standalone program only leaves
“breadcrumb trails” on display for a short while. I used to use the CMAP
Mark – Mariners Feature – Line option to trace the bread crumbs and keep
a permanent record of my track on the chart (on a user selectable
scale). CMAP was designed for use with a touch screen so the mouse based
functionality is not as easy to use as Maxsea’s more traditional windows
flavor. Maxsea also allows you to upload your routes to the GPS, and if
you want a better version check out Vesper’s version of MaxSend. However
Maxsea does not allow you to download anything from your GPS to the
computer, so make sure you have the ability to save a track on the GPS so
you can follow it out if needed. Some GPS units will overwrite the track data
points, so as you swing around the anchorage your track in will be
deleted, therefore make sure it is saved separately.
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