Northern Ireland Outdoors Forum - Hiking, camping and more
General => General Chat => Topic started by: Mourneman on October 19, 2011
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First day on the forum,must say really enjoyed reading over some of the stories & articles posted by other members.I'am always looking for ways to improve my navigation skills & was wondering do any other members have techniques for practising reading co-ordinates.when I 'am not on the hills I Facebook my hiking mate 6 digit grid references on marked features on a OS 125 scale,this helps me read the map quickly for a bearing.Does anybody else practise similar way of navigation .
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My map reading skills could do with improving so we be glad of a few tips myself!
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As much as I love the Mourne wall, it has us somewhat spoilt.
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You're totally right mate,the wall is a great feature for taking a bearing from, I recently walked Cuilcagh in Cavan,which apart from it's frontal ridge it pretty much featureless
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As i've just bought a garmin etrex i fear i may never look at a map again :o the mourne wall is indeed great, but make sure you follow the right wall ;) (as i learnt the hard way one misty evening ;D )
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I've a garmin etrex as well that I use for geocaching,but I have found that unless you have the high spec gps with preloaded and downloadable maps the a gps had limited function,Ie the straight line is not always the best path to follow,another example of this is a recent geocaching venture I had with fellow member ,mountain goat,we started off up the ott trek heading for geocache,"lake of the foxs"with our preloaded waypoint,weather conditions were very poor,with a very heavy fog down to about 10 feet in places,we crossed over the wall at slieve loughshannon and carried on down the gully to the lake,collected the cache & made in the direction of Doan,for our second cache,having found the cache we made our way down using our last way-point as a reference,but the gps,will simplify any route without the caution for dangerous features,in poor visibility the gps can also be dangerous tool,leading you sometimes to unseen features,crags,cliffs,marches,lately I've been using mine as a back up feature & trying to rely only map reading skills,don't get me wrong they are very useful piece of kit,but for me they're second place to a map & compass,or even thing that should be used with a Map & compass
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very true, can't rely on them totally, but if they have good maps on them with all the features listed then paper map isn't needed any more, unless the batteries run out :)
see this thread for some free map info
http://www.ni-wild.co.uk/forum/index.php?topic=1168.msg10254#msg10254
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nice one mate,good call,interesting,what about sports-tracker or google earth have any of guys used them for displaying way-points or routes?
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I could definitely do with some practice at mapreading. We're considering an evening out at one of the Lagan Valley Orienteers for some mapreading fun.
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I could definitely do with some practice at mapreading. We're considering an evening out at one of the Lagan Valley Orienteers for some mapreading fun.
I would deffo be up for that, keep us posted!
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sounds good red leader,Orienteering is a great way to improve navigation skills,keep me posted
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There's a good series on youtube with Simon King (the wildlife cameraman) which might be basic for some but are very good nonetheless.
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Nice one Paul,I'll check that out later,I heading to to find a few cache's
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i've been wanting to try orienteering too, but never wanted to turn up alone, i'm very shy :-[
your not heading to dundrum for a cache by any chance? chance of a first to find there ;)
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As i've just bought a garmin etrex i fear i may never look at a map again :o the mourne wall is indeed great, but make sure you follow the right wall ;) (as i learnt the hard way one misty evening ;D )
Aaa liam never relay on ur gps all the time I only use mine as a last resort if i'm not 100% sure were I am as i'm more a map & compas man ask john what happined with him using his gps & me using a M&C when vis was down to 10-15 m...
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A good way off improving ur map reading is doing a bit off night nav make the legs short & bild up a story on the way off what should be happing around yea if any 1 fancys a night off nigt nav give me a shout....
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just caught that post heading out the door ,dundrum cache ,new one,wats it's name mate?
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just caught that post heading out the door ,dundrum cache ,new one,wats it's name mate?
just back at the pc now so you may be too late
Dundrum Coastal Path 1 :
http://www.geocaching.com/seek/cache_details.aspx?wp=GC34R73
A good way off improving ur map reading is doing a bit off night nav make the legs short & bild up a story on the way off what should be happing around yea if any 1 fancys a night off nigt nav give me a shout....
yes i'd be up for a wee go at that some evening, any excuse to get into the hills ;D i see you don't even need a gps to find my geocaches ::) i'll have to put out a tricky one just for you ;)
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just caught that post heading out the door ,dundrum cache ,new one,wats it's name mate?
just back at the pc now so you may be too late
Dundrum Coastal Path 1 :
http://www.geocaching.com/seek/cache_details.aspx?wp=GC34R73
A good way off improving ur map reading is doing a bit off night nav make the legs short & bild up a story on the way off what should be happing around yea if any 1 fancys a night off nigt nav give me a shout....
yes i'd be up for a wee go at that some evening, any excuse to get into the hills ;D i see you don't even need a gps to find my geocaches ::) i'll have to put out a tricky one just for you ;)
M8 u dont even need to go into the hills there is a great place round spelck were u can do a bit. :) Well u make the nxt cache alot harder that was to easy...lol ;D
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That's where i was planning to take the scouts for some navigation practice, in the daylight though! there are a few geocaches round there that you will definitely need the gps for ;)
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That's where i was planning to take the scouts for some navigation practice, in the daylight though! there are a few geocaches round there that you will definitely need the gps for ;)
There r alot off things around there to find day or night so me/ john/ urself we'll get out some nite soon
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mondays and tuesdays usually suit me as i often have to drop my son to work at 7pm and pick him up at 11pm so that would suit a few hours in the hills, but i never jknow what he's working until the rota is made on sunday evening
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I did a brilliant refresher course in Tollymore National outdoor Centre. I did the advance course. The day we did the course was a very sunny day. The Next I was out with my walking group and we were walking from Pigeon over to Cock Mtn in pure mist (pea soup). I was able to put what I learned into practise and it worked. Just had to use the GPS once but I knew where I was most of the time. The GPS is good but could let you down. If you are going to get a GPS, make sure you learn the Map and Compass first. :) I have the basic extrex GPS.
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What did they charge for that? I'd be tempted to get a few of the peeps together and go do it.
I did a brilliant refresher course in Tollymore National outdoor Centre. I did the advance course. The day we did the course was a very sunny day. The Next I was out with my walking group and we were walking from Pigeon over to Cock Mtn in pure mist (pea soup). I was able to put what I learned into practise and it worked. Just had to use the GPS once but I knew where I was most of the time. The GPS is good but could let you down. If you are going to get a GPS, make sure you learn the Map and Compass first. :) I have the basic extrex GPS.
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http://www.outdoorni.com/events/2782/night-navigation/
Seen this and thought it might be of use to some.
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nice one Oisin,think i'll put my name down for that,cheers bud
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looks good value, but i see it starts at 2pm, isn't it bright then ::)
i ended up doing a little night nav myself tonight, crackin evening, breezy in places but plenty of stars out and a nice orange glow off the odd low cloud
(http://i1222.photobucket.com/albums/dd496/landyliam/2011/P1090377Small.jpg)
(http://i1222.photobucket.com/albums/dd496/landyliam/2011/P1090376Small.jpg)
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Where did u head to Liam?
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What did they charge for that? I'd be tempted to get a few of the peeps together and go do it.
I did a brilliant refresher course in Tollymore National outdoor Centre. I did the advance course. The day we did the course was a very sunny day. The Next I was out with my walking group and we were walking from Pigeon over to Cock Mtn in pure mist (pea soup). I was able to put what I learned into practise and it worked. Just had to use the GPS once but I knew where I was most of the time. The GPS is good but could let you down. If you are going to get a GPS, make sure you learn the Map and Compass first. :) I have the basic extrex GPS.
I was involved in the running of this course throught the UFRC whereby we got a group people from the some of the Afiliated Walking Clubs in NI along with some ROI members. They charged us £50 and we charged the members £40. Here is the link to their offer http://www.ufrc-online.co.uk/pdf%20files/Microsoft_Word__Intro_navigation_UFRC.pdf. We offered an Advance Course and a Basic. We had 8 for the Advance and 17 for the basic. They will ony offer the course if you have up to 8 people. The price is negotiable. If there were enough of you from this forum, I am sure you could organise this. It is worth doing.
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Where did u head to Liam?
It was in the trassey track area, a place I know fairly well, in fact I didn't even have to use the map very much, but of course it is all so different in the dark, some of those tracks are hard enough to find in the daylight! Big tip is to bring a good head AND spare batteries, my teammate had poor batteries and he struggled, I even nearly lost him at one point! My torch got low near the end of the exercise and it got a bit tricky but was heading back to the vehicle by then anyway. Also bring a spare hand torch just in case, I recommend the x21, google it, its amazing !
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Just googled it, what a torch! Something else to add to the dream list! Lol
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Good map reading skills are an Essential skill for anybody going onto the hills.A recent geocaching hike turned out to be real test of Mountain goat's & my ability to get a bearning in heavy fog,at times Visibility was down to about 14 ft & in an environment covered in fog it's hard to orientate yourself.
(http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6095/6291483010_6379e3c9fc.jpg) (http://www.flickr.com/photos/69203213@N03/6291483010/)
DSCN7824 (http://www.flickr.com/photos/69203213@N03/6291483010/) by surginor (http://www.flickr.com/people/69203213@N03/), on Flickr
me doing a map check at loughshannon
Although a G.P.S is a useful i think i would prefer the map & compass for navigation
(http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6226/6290966737_bdcf01e97e.jpg) (http://www.flickr.com/photos/69203213@N03/6290966737/)
(http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6098/6290954735_767808e5f0.jpg) (http://www.flickr.com/photos/69203213@N03/629096673
mountain goat on Doan
[url=http://www.flickr.com/photos/69203213@N03/6290954735/)
(http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6103/6291477274_9162d2444f.jpg) (http://www.flickr.com/photos/69203213@N03/629095473
taking a break before making our way back to the Ott trek
[url=http://www.flickr.com/photos/69203213@N03/6291477274/)
[url=http://www.flickr.com/photos/69203213@N03/629147727
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I wouldn't off say it was a reay test m8 :-\