We now know where we are!
It’s a good thing that I was (finally) able to get our GPS hooked up to our new GPSNavX application yesterday. Now we can definitely confirm that we are where we thought we were. Getting our GPS to play nice with our computer was not all that easy. Even after connecting them via our two new cables (which we spent a stupid amount of money on), the application could not “see” the GPS. After troubleshooting for more than an hour, seemingly doing the same two or three steps over and over, it just started working. I have no idea why but I do know how to take “yes” for an answer.
The little blue triangle marks our location and the GPS box shows our coordinates. Sadly you will note that the triangle is on land and not on the water. 🙁 Although we have yet to get any snow here, the weather outside is cold and raining. This is making me rethink my plan of going to the boat today to take some measurements for solar panels. I have been searching the web for images on how other boat owners have added solar to their boat. Often this is done with some sort of framework at the stern, which is what we will also be doing. The challenging part of dealing with boats is that virtually everything is a custom job. When there are only 50 or so items produced, as it was with our model of boat, there are not a ton of after-market accessories that you can just order in. So, based upon which panels we choose, and their size, we will have to fabricate a frame of some sort to hold them. Time will tell but I don’t think this should be a super hard job though.
I love your blog – always a new idea. Though I have been sailing longer and fixing things longer, I haven’t been sailing my PDQ much longer, and it’s great seeing a new owner’s spin on things.
One note on the solar panels; I recently mounted a bike rack on the stern rail, and it has worked out pretty well. I don’t like folding bikes and I love to have wheels instantly available when I make a new land fall. Is the salt hard on bikes? We oil them lots and the thrift stores will always have more! On the other hand, if my road bike gets to destroyed, tat will give me a good excuse to get a new snazzy one for home ( I was way into bike racing in college)!
The advantages of the stern mounted rack are several: they are not in the way sailing or docking; I can easy roll them off to the side when at a bulkhead or in a slip; I can easily lower them into the dingy; I can’t even imagine them on the tramp or on the side decks – I like open working areas. We also often climb straight up the back on to the transom from the dingy; it’s easier if it is bouncy.
So think about the bike rack idea. You strike me more like bicycle people than take a taxi people, and with cruising stores, I doubt there is room for bikes below.
Hi Drew
Thanks for the compliments, words of encouragement and your ideas. I regularly check out your blog and have gotten several ideas and inspiration from it. Rebecca and I do like to stay active and she was thinking that the folding ones would be useful for us. We’ll have to consider your solution though. Did you post pics on your blog of the bike rack on your boat? I don’t remember seeing them.
Mike
I just ran across this old article… Did you know that you could u se the GPS in your phone, and connect it via bluetooth to your mac? This then allows you to use an app (like google earth) and select the bluetooth GPS adapter from your phone.
If you ever have an issue cabling up your GPS again (they are often serial, and the USB to serial interfaces aren’t all that good on Mac to be honest) using your phone is a viable option.
Checkout the “Bluetooth GPS Output” app. It’s a buck in the google store. I’ve verified it works with Google Earth, but I don’t have GPSNavX to test it with yet.
hmmm… I did not know this. Thank you! I’ll look into this. Very cool.