What if GPS went away...

Solar Flare, March 6, 2012

If we were out in the middle of sea and the GPS stopped working, could we find our way around?  I better hope so.

Showing me your Nautical Signal Flags

EXODUS

Sharpening your Boating Skills and Safety

See below links for new Texas boating laws, CPR, Captain's license, engine, compass, radar, HAM radio, skin care, fire prevent, man overboard, cruising...

10 Question Boating Safety Practice Test

Test your boating knowledge with this 10 question boating safety practice test.

After completing the ASA 101 course and mentoring program years ago, I rented the Annapolis Book of Seamanship, (5 sailing training videos) from Netflix last winter to prepare for our big trip. Wow what a wealth of useful information. 

Fun facts too, such as most men found overboard have their flys down. In the man overboard drills, the poor boy who jumped in the water better have been paid extra for those scenes; heck we just practiced with a lifesaver. While there is some outdated info such as how to use the RDF (radio direction finders), the overall information is extremely useful (I even took notes).

Navigation: Charts, Computers, Stars, AIS

NOAA Chart- for Galveston Causeway Bridge and Offatts Bayou

Loaded a FREE Chart Software and the latest NOAA maps for TX (RNC) on my laptop. 

Tried Memory-Map (which I used on another laptop), but got an error saying, "could not load on system 32." Loaded up Map-tech Chart Navigator 5.08--worked great-- prefer some of the features better than Memory-Map. Loaded all the RNC for TX (some dated 11-10, dated on bottom left of map), but I plan to update the newest charts before we go cruising again. It took me a while to remember where everything was located (since last April). Hopefully this will be a go to site to find the links.