Essential Wilderness Navigator

Table of Contents

Introduction What’s New in this Edition 1. A Sense of Direction Locating Your Sixth Sense How Not to Get Lost Why We Get Lost How to “Get Found” 2. Maps The World in Your Hands Types of Maps Three Dimensions into Two The Language of Maps Reading the Terrain Latitude and Longitude Scale Distance Direction Putting Yourself on the Map Map Care and Gear 3. Compasses What Compasses Can Do Earth’s Magnetic Field How Compasses Work Make Your Own Declination Compass Types Orienting Your Compass to Magnetic North Orienting Your Compass to Geographic North Bearings Deviation Following a Compass Course Testing Your Skills 4. Navigation Map and Compass Combined Orienting the Map with a Compass Finding a Course from the Map Locating a Mapped Object in the Field Locating an Observed Object on the Map A Bearing from a Mapped Object Other Lines of Position Warning Bearings Crossing Lines of Position Returning to the Same Spot A Running Fix Finding Distance Off Measuring Distance Covered Dead Reckoning 5. Navigation in Use Route Planning The Practice of Navigation On the Trail Hitting What You Aim For Landmarks as Guides Sources of Error When You Are Lost 6. Looking to Nature for Clues Finding North and South at Noon North and South from a Shadow Quick but Inaccurate Movements of Sunrise and Sunset Bearings from Sunrise and Sunset Polaris The Southern Cross Other Stars 7. Extreme Environments Mountains Snow Deserts 8. Electronic Navigation GPS 101 Getting Started E-Maps: Topos and Charts on CD-ROM 9. Appendix Bearings of Sunrise and Sunset Declination Corrections Metric Conversion Tables Orienteering Sources of Maps, Books, Compasses, Videos, GPS Manufacturers, and Electronic Mapmakers Travel Plan Index Acknowledgments

About the Author

David Seidman has spent a good portion of his life finding his way around the world. He’s crossed oceans, toured central Asia and Mongolia without a map or the ability to speak the language, and found a Mayan ruin in Guatemala. He is the author of The Essential Sea Kayaker and The Complete Sailor and is an editor at Boating magazine. Paul Cleveland has worked as a wilderness ranger in New Mexico and designed and built trails in the Appalachians. He is a frequent contributor to Backpacker and Climbing magazines and the Gorp.com Web pages. He guides whitewater rafting trips and teaches CPR and first aid for the Red Cross and wilderness navigation for Outward Bound.