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I do not know anyone serious about the outdoors that does not know how to use a map and compass. Extremely straightforward to learn. I hike with a Garmin fore
by dogman144 3y ago
I do not know anyone serious about the outdoors that does not know how to use a map and compass.
Extremely straightforward to learn.
I hike with a Garmin foretrex, I route plan and land nav when out there with a map. The garmin sanity checks me once in a while.
There is a significant amount of bad stuff that can go very wrong, to start, just bc your Garmin’s altimeter and calibration is bugging out while you mindlessly follow. And when you’re in areas where this matters (ie “can I hear street noise” judgment”), the out of the box technical land navigation tools tend to not work out of the box.
I’ve had an updated and calibrated Garmin put me 5-600m away from where I definitely was via map, compass triangulation and then sanity check with a iPhone b/c the difference really surprised me. 5-600m difference is quite consequential. Mix in Garmin using optionally Glonass (Russian satellites), there’s just a lot of stuff that can go sideways. Easy enough to buy a compass, map protector, local map. Even something like knowing what and how to shoot an emergency azimuth can solve an otherwise crisis situation.
- eternityforest 3y agoEveryone serious about the outdoors probably does, but lots of more casual people don't. I'm assuming that's how a lot people get lost, because the casual people suddenly decide to try something out of their skill level without knowing it's out of their skill level, because GPS has always hidden their lack of skill. I don't think just buying a map and compass is a guarantee, for the casual people who don't know what they're doing, and the military has entire navigation classes, seems like it's a real nontrivial skill that you have to actually learn. Definitely a good idea to learn, but GPS makes it easy to not know how much you don't know.