Electronic Navigation - $365

The convergence of GPS, electronic charts, LCD displays, weather-crunching supercomputers and wireless Internet access has revolutionized marine navigation so quickly that impressive benefits have yet to trickle down to most sailors. And significant advances in the technology continue to appear every season.

This six week course will cover basic GPS techniques, raster & vector charts, plus hardware and navigational software. We'll examine the conventional and gridded weather forecasts available online, and introduce weather routing software. Our approach will concentrate on evaluating the data underlying electronic navigation, and emphasize on-the-water practicality, not just ogle the most expensive new gadgets.

There are no prerequisites, but a fluency in traditional navigation is highly desirable. This course will not cover the fundamental navigation skills and elements of seamanship that are required to competently skipper a cruising boat.

The course work will be more convenient if you have a laptop running Windows or OS X and a handheld GPS, but neither is required to participate fully.

Format
Six classroom sessions from 6 to 8pm held on Thursdays.

Start Date
Febuary 25, 2010

Call the office at 617-227-4198 to sign up.