Sextant Navigation

[jiveturkey]

Just curious, with all the sea lovers on this board if any of you are sextant enthusiasts? I'm a lover of marine history and I've always admired the early explorers' ability to navigate using charts, a few tools and the sun. I know it's a fairly complex science but I'm just wondering if anybody does it as a hobby. There was a thread on here a few days ago about gps. That's cool too but it doesn't have the romance associated with the old ways.

 

[seadog]

Wife and I have both taken USPS courses dealing with sextant use. Not as hard as you would think. We always carry one or more on our boat but have only use them to practice; hate to say it but we rely on the electronics.

 

[jbd]

the course yet that seadog mentioned but I have a book about it. Basically its a lot of trigonometry involving the sun etc but its kind of like dive tables someone has already done the math for you

GPS works on the same principle so is there anything really new under the sun?

 

[jiveturkey]

What book do you have jbd? Is this something I could teach myself?

 

[Jonathan]

the RYA as I believe it is still a requirement for their ocean going courses.

The RYA is the Royal Yachting Association and as you can probably guess by the name is British.

Jonathan

 

[jiveturkey]

That's great. Thanks Jonathon.

 

[Wendy]

When I first read your topic I thought it said "Sexist Navigation" I thought it was a thread about guys that won't ask for directions.

 

[scuberd]

Wendy once bubbled...
When I first read your topic I thought it said "Sexist Navigation" I thought it was a thread about guys that won't ask for directions.

as soon as we NEED directions we will stop and ask.