Land Navigation 101 (discussion thread)

swampdragon · 07-15-2010, 01:40 AM

This will be the discussion thread for any and all questions, comments, concerns, observations, suggestions, etc....for the Land Navigation 101 "Sticky."

The Sticky is meant to be a "class" so to speak.
You read through it and you should be OK.

All discussions will take place here so as to not completely clutter up the official Sticky in case someone wants to download it.
I will continue to add more to the Sticky as we progress in that subject.
Make sense?

**Mac_Muz** · 07-16-2010, 08:05 PM

Makes sence. I am a old hand in the primitive and wonder if a GPS would work, and if so could it point you out if you used it? I can do a compass and map ok. I used to mess around in dead winter in white out and get to where i wanted to be. Sometimes cliff and river got in my way since i couldn't see far. Over time on the maps I marked out I got better, partly because i knew the land better, and partly because the markings I made on the map from days I could see came to mean something.

I got to understand what it is to be lost, not far from places i knew, but once a 3rd brook threw me for a loop, and I ended up spending the night in a root hole. That didn't go over with my now x wife very well.

I need to go read the sticky. Done.

A point to consider is taking a back bearing with a compass which insures the bearing taken first is accurate. In practicing, sometimes i would use deeds to property and look to find obsure markers said to be found on old deeds. Due to trees and brush pacing was difficult at best. In this way i have found all the markers to complicated lots of 10 achers or so, where old water pipes and lawn mower mufflers even were used as the marker.
Often times a tree on the deed was gone, sometimes it was all gone, other times a stump was left. On more than one occasion a wiskey bottle or two would be on the marker, but I am not sure what that means.

There are some crooked boundry lines around here though, some shingling of property has taken place too.

swampdragon · 07-16-2010, 10:37 PM

Yeah Mac,

You bring up some very good points. Especially about the 3rd brook.
I always advise people to scout their areas more than once, and do it at different times of the year.
Everything you just said...I agree with.

Map symbols and markers, as well as terrain association when paths and roads may be hidden....will be a part of the Land Nav 101 class.
So will reading a map and figuring out your coordinates.
It's a work in progress that I still have much more to add to.

Please feel free to bring up anything and everything that you feel I may have missed.
The class isn't about "me."
It's for everybody to share equally as well as contribute to as needed.

I appreciate your input...

**Mac_Muz** · 07-17-2010, 11:06 AM

Well I know I can be wordy, and am trying to not drive you over the edge. Praying for forgiveness.

I play with a compass and a map/ chart even sailing my canoe. I keep a 35mm Minolta camera in a ammo box painted silver to reduce heat. In that box i keep lake charts too and a compass, the last items are a few stubby penclils a plastic clear triangle marked in metric and inches, and a pen knife. That compass has a stick on velcro, so when the box is closed I can stick the compass on the lid.

On all maps i work with I make notes on the borders and track where I was and any objects I found.

Some lakes have stone walls under water and I like to know that. On land maps i find things like old shot up copper water heaters, or old logging tools like a slave whip (2 man felling saw).

I can't carry these things far, and don't need them for other things, but I know where they are if i ever do.

Good carbon steel even if rusty is a great find, and to know where it is makes it a valuable resource, in SHTF.

With ease i could create a list of tools i could make from a old dead saw blade I find in the woods, and another for a shot up copper water heater.

I won't bore anyone to death with the list.

About where for everyone is going to be a different place. Being both a modern hiker and a primitive trecker, and in part moving to NH knowing some history. learning more, The fact the cold war was still on at the time made a big difference to my locations.

One day I read about a light gentle rain hikers in 1938 wrote about. At the time I knew a wild hurricane was blowing RI into Mass hard, the strom tracked up the Ct river hard. And yet these hikers only had a light rain?

I had to go see that place, known as the Giant Stairs.

Nice spot. Commands a 270 degree view, has 2 water sources, and is naturally sheltered from any direction. The only thing that can move a man from that place is a Wart Hog A-10, and don't even ask How i know that.

I can talk about that place since it is no longer on my list. I live to far from there now is why.

**O.S.O.K.** · 07-18-2010, 11:18 AM

Well I certainly like the GPS but I don't like how they go "out of style" so quickly. I had a nice old one that slowly stopped working so fast.... to the point it became almost useless - not the unit's fault - they've changed the satelites or something. Anyway, I do like them. However, I also always carry a good compass and GS map with me when "out back".

Re-learned the orienteering in BSA as a scoutmaster - both of my boys are good at it and the compass doesn't need batteries... or access to satelites...