Test your navigation skills with the Navigation Challenge

[johngo]

Wowzer, all these people on this board who are fairly active hikers, and no one has tried this wilderness challenge yet?

People here apparently are fine with 43 pages of pictures of their dogs, but no one wants to talk / learn about something more substantial, like learning proper navigation techniques, sheesh . . .

we've had plenty of navigation threads on here in fact one of the forum members created several lessons shared here.

Most users on this forum never leave the trail...

Koda,
Yes, I think I have seen those lessons that one of our generous forum members has posted. That's some pretty good material. However, because using a compass is such a hands on the thing to do, most people find it much easier to learn from a live demonstration, or next best thing, a video instruction, rather than reading about it in a book. It's sort of like learning to tie a knot. Can you imagine learning how to tie, say, a bow knot to tie your shoes, by reading about it in a book? It would be ridiculous. But it's easy to learn by watching a short video a few times.

And, amusing that you noticed that most people on this forum never leave the trail. I have a strong belief that the more personal and powerful memories of past adventures almost always come from trips taken off trail. And, even if you choose to stay on trail, knowing how to print free maps and download GPS tracks to your phone app so you know the correct route to take, and knowing some basic compass skills, is certainly good practice.

[johngo]

a 130 page powerpoint style pdf "navigation challenge" isn't really the most appealing for people casually browsing the internet either, especially when you have to jump through hoops to find it.

I still haven't hit the challenge part yet? Not sure that I'd agree with everything in there either

Hi Lurch,
You are generally correct here, that casual web servers are probably not gonna drop everything to take half an hour or so to go through this material.
But, some might see the value of it, make a note, and return when they have some time to learn something substantial.
It takes most people about 30 minutes to go through the challenge.

Regarding "jumping through hoops . . ." Yes, you do need to click through three links and wait maybe 10 seconds for everything to load. It was mentioned to me a while back that posting a random link to a Google Drive file on a discussion form makes some people suspicious, and I can't blame them come, I probably would not want to click the link like that myself. Having the link go through a legitimate website, like croc.org, may alleviate suspicions that some people might have that their computer is going to catch Ebola if they click on some random Google Drive link. I sure you, it is an innocuous PDF file, and the Google virus filters are pretty robust.

And, congratulations to you if you went through all of this and found nothing to be very challenging. That's the idea, to test your navigation skills.
I would not expect an expert navigator to agree with everything that I had posted. That's kind of why I asked, to generate some discussion.
What areas do you think could be improved, or in which you have another opinion?

[Koda]

Wowzer, all these people on this board who are fairly active hikers, and no one has tried this wilderness challenge yet?

People here apparently are fine with 43 pages of pictures of their dogs, but no one wants to talk / learn about something more substantial, like learning proper navigation techniques, sheesh . . .

we've had plenty of navigation threads on here in fact one of the forum members created several lessons shared here.

Most users on this forum never leave the trail...

Koda,
Yes, I think I have seen those lessons that one of our generous forum members has posted. That's some pretty good material. However, because using a compass is such a hands on the thing to do, most people find it much easier to learn from a live demonstration, or next best thing, a video instruction, rather than reading about it in a book. It's sort of like learning to tie a knot. Can you imagine learning how to tie, say, a bow knot to tie your shoes, by reading about it in a book? It would be ridiculous. But it's easy to learn by watching a short video a few times.

And, amusing that you noticed that most people on this forum never leave the trail. I have a strong belief that the more personal and powerful memories of past adventures almost always come from trips taken off trail. And, even if you choose to stay on trail, knowing how to print free maps and download GPS tracks to your phone app so you know the correct route to take, and knowing some basic compass skills, is certainly good practice.

John, I agree that hands on can be more practical way to learn navigation but Im not encouraging people to travel off trail anymore. They either want to do it on their own, then Im glad to have them along.

I like your lesson idea (I haven't read it yet). When I clicked on it I saw it was lengthy and I didn't have time. I wouldn't mind learning more myself but I'm well aware I could sign up for a class somewhere. I think for a web forum thread type of introduction most people would benefit from something super simplified. Thats what I meant by most people here never leave the trail.

[johngo]

Ditto on this. I'd not seen this before either. I checked it out, and while I found it interesting, the format wasn't the best for an online "challenge". It also seemed a bit of a hard sell for the caltopo website, which I found rather odd.

Hey Rob,
What kind of alternative format would you suggest? That's why I'm putting this out here, so I can get some ideas to improve the material. I'm not a savvy enough computer programmer to make any kind of cool JavaScript type thing.

And, regarding Caltopo, I am singing it's praises because I feel it is the single best online wilderness mapping resource currently available.
I have absolutely no connection to the founder of the website nor any financial interest in it whatsoever.
I used to be a big fan of Gmap4, but Caltopo has several features that are greatly superior, so I no longer recommend it to any of my navigation students.

Do you or anyone else here have an online mapping source that you think is better? If so, please let me know I'll check it out and replace Caltopo with the next best thing.

[RobFromRedland]

What kind of alternative format would you suggest? That's why I'm putting this out here, so I can get some ideas to improve the material. I'm not a savvy enough computer programmer to make any kind of cool JavaScript type thing.

And, regarding Caltopo, I am singing it's praises because I feel it is the single best online wilderness mapping resource currently available.
I have absolutely no connection to the founder of the website nor any financial interest in it whatsoever.
I used to be a big fan of Gmap4, but Caltopo has several features that are greatly superior, so I no longer recommend it to any of my navigation students.

Do you or anyone else here have an online mapping source that you think is better? If so, please let me know I'll check it out and replace Caltopo with the next best thing.

Even putting it out as a series of static web pages (essentially making each of the pages in your powerpoint a web page) would be better I think. You could host it on the croc website - the other plus would be people wouldn't have to be worried about downloading some weird PDF file. Once the static pages were created you could go in and make change/improvements to the pages slowly, as you learned more skills - or found someone willing to help you make it more interactive.

As far as caltopo goes, it is an excellent resource. I guess my comment was more geared towards HOW you stated it. I re-read the sections where you referenced caltopo, and maybe I'm being too critical. It does kind of come off as a commercial, but it was mostly limited to one slide.

I still find gmap4 to be highly useful - there is also hillmap.com which is very good. For just looking at maps, I find gmap4 to be more useful since it has fewer features - there is less to wade thru when I just want to look at a map with maybe an overlay on it - Caltopo has a LOT of options and menus which can be intimidating for new users. I also find gmap4 to be useful to make links to show tracks that I can give to others. But for printing maps, Caltopo has no equal.

I find the different mapping websites to have different strengths and weaknesses and all have value depending on what you are doing. I'm so very thankful for the developers of all these tools that have made them available for free. They are truly a wonderful resource.

[johngo]

What kind of alternative format would you suggest? That's why I'm putting this out here, so I can get some ideas to improve the material. I'm not a savvy enough computer programmer to make any kind of cool JavaScript type thing.

And, regarding Caltopo, I am singing it's praises because I feel it is the single best online wilderness mapping resource currently available.
I have absolutely no connection to the founder of the website nor any financial interest in it whatsoever.
I used to be a big fan of Gmap4, but Caltopo has several features that are greatly superior, so I no longer recommend it to any of my navigation students.

Do you or anyone else here have an online mapping source that you think is better? If so, please let me know I'll check it out and replace Caltopo with the next best thing.

Even putting it out as a series of static web pages (essentially making each of the pages in your powerpoint a web page) would be better I think. You could host it on the croc website - the other plus would be people wouldn't have to be worried about downloading some weird PDF file. Once the static pages were created you could go in and make change/improvements to the pages slowly, as you learned more skills - or found someone willing to help you make it more interactive.

As far as caltopo goes, it is an excellent resource. I guess my comment was more geared towards HOW you stated it. I re-read the sections where you referenced caltopo, and maybe I'm being too critical. It does kind of come off as a commercial, but it was mostly limited to one slide.

I still find gmap4 to be highly useful - there is also hillmap.com which is very good. For just looking at maps, I find gmap4 to be more useful since it has fewer features - there is less to wade thru when I just want to look at a map with maybe an overlay on it - Caltopo has a LOT of options and menus which can be intimidating for new users. I also find gmap4 to be useful to make links to show tracks that I can give to others. But for printing maps, Caltopo has no equal.

I find the different mapping websites to have different strengths and weaknesses and all have value depending on what you are doing. I'm so very thankful for the developers of all these tools that have made them available for free. They are truly a wonderful resource.

Hey Rob,

Thanks for your constructive suggestions.

Warning, nerd content ahead…
The PDF file I have is generated as an export from a Mac Keynote file, which is the Mac version of PowerPoint.
Because the original file is in Keynote, it makes it very easy to make any adjustments to a single slide, save the whole file again as a new PDF, and then upload it to Google Docs. I use the keynote file in the navigation instruction lectures that I give throughout the year, so I am inclined to stick to my current format and less there is a pretty pressing reason to try something different.

And, regarding your comments of the bounty of mapping resources we enjoy, I completely agree with you! Yes, Gmap4 for and Hillmap can be useful, and for folks who are already familiar with them and like it, that's terrific. However, I feel most people who are new to navigation are better served by learning a single best source for maps, and not to be confused by mentioning three different ones for them to experiment with. (It's sort of like someone learning knots for rock climbing - they do not need to learn three different ways to tie a clove hitch, they need to learn ONE way inside and out.)

I was a big advocate for Gmap4 for a couple of years, when Calopo was getting started and still was pretty quirky. But now that the program is so smooth, it has both features that power users can appreciate, and is still simple enough that people can print basic maps with just a few minutes of instruction. Specifically, Caltopo offers great printing of different map layers, at any scale you want, on various sizes of paper, as well as easy import and export of GPX files.

If you search YouTube for "Caltopo", the first video that comes up is about a 10 minute tutorial that I made, which should be more than enough to get people started.

Again, I appreciate your constructive comments, and hopefully those reading this looking for more navigation instruction can check out and appreciate all of these mapping resources.

[Webfoot]

I read the PDF. I have little experience with navigation but I have stared at a lot of topo maps. I either knew or could figure out (without "cheating") almost everything in the presentation, except that I was unfamiliar with UTM coordinates.

I take issue with the apparent assumption that North is "up" (e.g. slide 74) without the inclusion of a map rose. If this was asserted somewhere I missed it.

[johngo]

I read the PDF. I have little experience with navigation but I have stared at a lot of topo maps. I either knew or could figure out (without "cheating") almost everything in the presentation, except that I was unfamiliar with UTM coordinates.

I take issue with the apparent assumption that North is "up" (e.g. slide 74) without the inclusion of a map rose. If this was asserted somewhere I missed it.

Webfoot,
Thank you for your comments. It's great that you were able to have correct answers on almost everything, that means your navigation skills are pretty solid. Yes, UTM coords are something new for a lot of people, but if you use GPS at all it's helpful to have some understanding of them. If you watch the video I made on them, you will have them figured out pretty well. Search YouTube for "UTM coordinates", my video comes up first.

Your point about the assumption that north is at the top of the map is excellent. That is a little oversight on my part. I will add it to the disclaimer on slide number 2 or so, right art the beginning. You are correct, one can never assume that north is always at the top of the map.

Thanks!

[Lurch]

It bothers me when people truncate UTMs, that's bad form. Rounding is questionable, but semi acceptable. I still wouldn't round all the way to 100 meters though, when I'm training people we require +/- 25m accuracy in plotting and locating coordinates.

If you want to truncate, switch to MGRS or USNG.

[johngo]

It bothers me when people truncate UTMs, that's bad form. Rounding is questionable, but semi acceptable. I still wouldn't round all the way to 100 meters though, when I'm training people we require +/- 25m accuracy in plotting and locating coordinates.

If you want to truncate, switch to MGRS or USNG.

Hi Lurch,

I hear you on the truncating UTM coords (aka, take the last two digits and make them zero to pluck your position to about 100 m accuracy.)

When I first learned UTM coordinates, I was taught to round off. This just intuitively made sense to me as it would seemingly give you a more accurate position. Then, in researching it further, I read from a couple of fairly reputable sources that you should not round off, but rather truncate. Initially that did not seem to make much sense to me, but I thought OK, I'm hearing it from a SAR team manual, that must be right. So now I teach truncating. Perhaps I will go back to rounding, is ultimately it probably doesn't make much difference.

25 m accuracy in plotting coordinates is pretty impressive. I am assuming you are using a map romer, or some sort of plotting tool? While some professional users, such as SAR teams, foresters, archaeologists, wildland firefighters, etc. might need that level of precision, I feel that most civilians are going to be fine with about 100 m. For example, ff you need to tell 911 where to send the search party that should be more than sufficient.

25 m accuracy usually requires some additional plotting tools, and in my experience cannot really be done on a standard scale map around 1:25,000 on 8.5 x 11 paper by eyeball alone. I do not encourage most casual users to carry things like a map romer, because they are small, somewhat fragile, and easily lost.

There is a simple compass modification that anyone can do in a few minutes that can increase the accuracy of UTM coordinate plotting: take a couple of short strips of athletic tape, and put them on the top and right-hand edge of your compass. Copy the one kilometer scale, in the hundred meter increments, onto each side of the table using a fine tip sharpie pen. Now, if you put the upper right corner of your compass on any point on the map, you should instantly be able to see the easting and northing and 100 m increments, no guesswork required.

You can see this demonstrated in this video, starting at about 8:37
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qstBRB8Og18