Using GPS on rivers & canals

[Trevor Lyons]

In my sailing days, I naturally used GPS, and in recent times my favourite is the Garmin Echomap Plus 65v, which comes with an inbuilt world map that's good enough to navigate with, not to mention an embedded higly-detailed chart of the UK, Ireland and the northwest coast of Europe from Hamburg to Brest (the main cruising zones for UK-based yachtsmen. Additional detailed maps (one at a time) for most sea and ocean areas. These Echomaps are going for £399 at Marine Superstore; a bargain!

 

Garmin also produce a chart of German inland waterways (VEU060R) that also covers Austria and small bits of France Belgium, Netherlands, Switzerland, Hungary and Slovakia, so presumably idea for a Rhine-Maine-Danube cruise. As yet, as far as I know, there's no full equivalent for France, Belgium and the Netherlands.

 

To come to the point:  I'll install my Echomap on my barge anyway; but does anyone any experience of using the VEU060R chart? Any good?

Edited January 6, 2020 by Trevor Lyons

[Alan de Enfield]

I use Navionics, for one fee you can download it onto a PC, Tablet, Laptop, Apple Phone, Android phone etc.

 

 

https://www.navionics.com/gbr/navionics-plus-central-and-west-europe-uk.html

[Trevor Lyons]

Since I already have a Garmin EchoMap, I may as well use it, and I'm sufficientIy old fashioned to like to have charts "hard-wired" into the gps system. (I still buy CDs & DVDs, much to my children's incredulity!) I note that Garmin are now linked with Navionics, and "BlueChart g3 Regular" map chips are available for the four main areas of European waterways that I'm ever likely to use, as follows:

 

S/E England & Benelux Inland Waters

Code: 010-C0761-20/UKP

https://www.navionics.com/gbr/garmin-bluechart-g3-s-e-england-belux-inland-waters-4.html

 

Alborg-Amsterdam

Code: 010-C0776-20/UKP

https://www.navionics.com/gbr/garmin-bluechart-g3-alborg-amsterdam-4.html

 

France Inland Waters

Code: 010-C1104-20/UKP

https://www.navionics.com/gbr/garmin-bluechart-g3-france-inland-waters-4.html

 

Germany Inland Waters

Code: 010-C1103-20/UKP

https://www.navionics.com/gbr/garmin-bluechart-g3-germany-inland-waters-4.html

[Trevor Lyons]

I am at last installing some nav instruments on my barge (having had other priorities since I last posted over a year ago). These are:

* Garmin Echomap Plus 65v

* Standard Horizon GX2200E VHF radio with DSC, AIS, & internal GPS.

 

The Garmin installation instructions leave a lot to be desired; it's easy enough to get power in, but the other two input cables are dealt with rather peremptorily.

I would like to connect the two devices, not least so that AIS targets on the VHF screen will also be shown with more accuracy of the GPS chart plotter. Obviously useful when in coastal waters, but is linking the two instruments worth the bother on a canal boat? Do the big peniches transmit their AIS data? Or would one never get an AIS signal when inland?

[GUMPY]

I have seen AIS coming from boats on the Thames up as far as Oxford and on the Severn. Not many I grant you but there have been some.

There are pleasure craft at Maidenhead Benson and Worcester at the moment.