How are your basic navigation skills?

How are peoples navigation skills here? Whether it be map reading, celestial navigation or just playing it by ear as you go along and hoping for the best, what training/skills do you have or keep brushed up on?

I posted this here as it's a survival issue, but i was'nt particularly thinking of when the SHTF, but even something as trivial as a walk in the woods.

I am often to be found walking through the woods with my kids, the same woods that i played in as a kid myself and would like to say that i know like the back of my hand.

That said, wait a few hours until it's pitch black, and that same forest playground that i know every part of, becomes a blind maze which can be no fun to be in. If the cold sets in or starts pouring from the heavens, you really don't want to be out there more than a few hours if you can help it.

If you want to look at it from a "situation X" scenario, the local rural area you think you know well, could well become your new home or route to safety. So how well do you think you would do?

Do you have an up to date map of your surrounding areas? Can you use it? Have you actualy been out and tried navigating a few miles around the map?

How about navigation by the stars? Anyone interested or particularly skilled in this field?

As for maps, what kind do people recommend for when the worst comes to the worst? Is your average OS map ok, or are there other maps that people would find handy?

CX.



[edit on 4/3/08 by CX]

Good thread.

I had overland navigation training and am comfortbale using a marching compass and slide rule with a decent map.

The woods at night! Sometimes after a night out drinking I go to a local trailhead and try to walk it drunk in the dark with no flashlight. I always go someplace I have been during the day of course. It is great training of your natural night vision and it's kind of fun to stumble around in the woods in near blackness drunk as a high school prom date. Plus when you do come across campers or something their reactions are priceless.

I actually dated a girl I met like that for a few months..

Anyway, practice with a map and a compass is essential. Even if you find yourself in the great unkown without said items, being familiar with them greatly enhances your natural abilities to determine heading and distance.

If I had to navigate by the stars I would be finished.

Good thread.

[edit on 4-3-2008 by Tinhatman]

Like Tinhatman, I would be lost navigating by stars.

I am an expert at dismounted and mounted land navigation with a map, however. Cavalry Scouts kinda have to be.

Best bet for those who aren’t is to get a topo of your area, a compass and a protractor and then find someone who was combat arms military. Although most GIs are crapy with a map they can usually teach you the basics enough that you can practice.

Learn to shoot an azimuth, back azimuth and most importantly LEARN YOU OWN PACE COUNT! You need to know how far you are traveling with each step. Measure out 50 meters and walk it a few times, counting how many steps you take. Do on varied terrain. Knowing your pace will allow you to tell how far you have traveled, very important when trying to get somewhere with a map. Get some cool black skull ranger beads (pace cord) and tie one to your key chain, or your cars mirror if you wear a suit. Keep a military map of your area in your glove box, along with compass and protractor. If you don’t have the ranger beads, you can use rocks, so you should practice with them. Take ten pebbles in your left hand and put one in your pocket every 50 meters.

I do however think there is some natural skill you just can’t lean. I always know which way is north (+/- 10 degrees) and that is not something you can learn. Maybe I ate too many paint chips as a kid and the metal in my head points me north


[edit on 4-3-2008 by cavscout]

[edit on 4-3-2008 by cavscout]

Cavscout made a lot of great points about land nav. I would suggest that if you get the equipment he mentioned to find a place that you know well and associate the terrian features from your map to real life. Doing this in a a "safe" place will allow you to associate the real terrain to your topographical map. It is one thing to know what a hill looks like or a ridge or a draw on a map...nothing like being able to see them both while learning.

Night time makes everything change. In the beginning you may notice that your pace count for 50m (we always used a 100) will increase. or that when you get tired your count will change... something to practice...just things to keep in mind.

As far as navigating by the stars...well I have a good compass...does that count? I have very little experience with it but have begun learning the constellations with my daughter...something she is interested in and it cant hurt

Originally posted by kaferwerks

I have very little experience with it but have begun learning the constellations with my daughter...something she is interested in and it cant hurt

I have this book at home,and has been a great tool for teaching both myself and my two girls about the constellations. Came highly recommended.

The Stars.....a New Way To See Them

We try and learn at least one a week in detail, it's great even for just a general walk at night, keeps the kids interested.

CX.

[edit on 5/3/08 by CX]

I'm pretty okay with navigating by stars. We learned the basics camping in the jungles. But you can't always see the stars in a rainforest with plenty of cloud cover. So we learned how to use plants and vines to determine compass direction.

If you ever visit Malaysia, you might want to check this course out:
Jungle Survival Training Program

reply to post by cavscout


Do you assosiate your directions by finding a dominant feature in terrain and comparing your directions to it while navigating? Because i do and i do it without thinking or paying attention to it. I discovered how i did it when the guys in my Recon team started asking me how i allways know where we are going even tough i hardly ever used a compass. In addition i have a very good map memory, i can still navigate in areas i've seen maps 5 to 10 years ago...

All that comes from 15 years of competitive orienteering. I competed from the age of 5 to my early 20's. So practise makes you develope your own ways of finding your way

Ps. I never count my steps, i merely compare the distance ahead to a known distance in my memory. (Usually a 100m running stretch )

PPS. Cavscout, in my opinion vehicle navigation is much harder than on foot, as usually the visibility is much more reduced.

Northwolf,
Ex-Cpl FRDF Mechanized Recon

I can navigate myself from point A to Point B without too much difficulty. I still get lost ocassionally though, so I foresee a lot more practice is in the near future. My wife is like a homing pigeon however, and seems to never get lost or disoriented.

I think navigation is an innate ability for some people, and one that must be practiced continually for others. I'm definitely in the latter category.

My best suggestion is buy a expensive, high quality compass. Even without training, one could go out into the bush and do some practice bush walks. Use only natural lands marks, like ridges and hills. Mix it up make many twists and turns for yourself, after a few such outings you will have an exceptional ability to use a compass and a topographical map.

Mine is not as good as it once was been a long time since I had to use a compass and a map I do remember you should always have two compasses in case one gets broke or lost



[edit on 10-3-2008 by Papa Sierra]

Navigation skills, are to me really easy. I am good with a map and compass and can't remember ever getting lost and needing help with getting back on track (except once, but the idea of how to get out of the problem we had was the same as we were suggested).

And for obviousness if you are lost, (not that I think anyone here won't know it) walking downhill leads to water. And generally a road as well in most places, and there, hopefully, some sort of a sign, to get you back right.

And a useful thing is to know how many paces roughly it takes you to go 100 metres. That, and a compass, and you can't get too lost, even in the fog, unless the terrain screws the compass. If you want to get really good, try navigating to the obscurest thing you can find in contour features on your OS map.

In fact, if you go to the Ordnance survey website and use get a map, enter this grid reference: SK 148 904. If you see that tiny indentation in the contour to the west near the centre, when I did some navigation training once the group I was in had to find that exact point.

Originally posted by Tenebrous
My best suggestion is buy a expensive, high quality compass.

After semi-pro orienteering career much like north wolf (from childhood to my twenties, stopped couple years ago), some tips.

DONT get an expensive competition class orienteering plate/thumb-compass as a survival compas.
a) they are all made from plastic because of weight. they do take guite much beating, but not that much.
b) fanzy bearing systems. many comp. model compasses have complex bearing systems to make reading-ring turn nicely. have broken couple such bearings, wont last
c) liguid filling, yes there is liguid inside most better compasses. makes compass steadier and faster to use. Downside is, if casing may leak gas bubbles inside the liquid. which will ruin compass, because gas bubbles push the needle around. resulting false readings. After long use and beating seams leak even in some good quality compasses. have seen many of these.
d)has no sighting system.

So instead get a metal framed military model compas which has sighting system for taking directions. very usefull, because you can locate yourself on map, if you get your direction to two known landmarks at map. plus good metal frame is allmost impossible to destroy.

If compas has no filling, it is more rugged. Without filling needle oscillates little, so it is not as precice and fast to use as filled. This is not very important at survival, because you dont need to be so fast.

If you are going to get filled compass, then get very good guality one. Bad guality fillled compass can get gas bubble inside it just from knocking it couple times. so ask from dealer, if compas has liguid inside. After that ask if that model is easy getting bubbles inside it. In case dealer does not know what "getting bubbles inside" means, he/she has no idea what stuff he/she sells. If you happen to find store that specialices in orienteering eguipment ask them if they have sightingmodels. Those stores usually sell only good quality stuff.

What I looked on net US military camenga looks good, but cost a lot (comments from US army guys, are those good guality ones). Get something like that, but get good guality one. You don't want your compass showing you wrong direction or breaking in peaces at the middle of wilderness. you are in big trouble if you get lost in there, when emergency services are down.

We used finnish made Suunto hand-bearing compasses at armys FO jobs, but for these things they are little over shoot. You don't need one unless you are going to command artillery fire and looks like those cost 150€ a peace. no wonder our groupleader was very worried about that thing. But if you have extra money, those things are just about the best you can get.

i would recommend taking one sturdy sighting compass and one plasticplate compass with you. it is much more easier to work on map with platecompas than with sightingmodels. if you can take couple extra ones, can sell them to someone.

MAINRULE: EVERY PERSON MUST HAVE COMPASS WITH HIM/HER ALLWAYS, WHEN IN WILD. even if you move at group, everyone must allways have some kind of compass and possibly a map. I know a friend of mine who had orienteered for years getting lost 500 m from our base car, when we were taking apart orienteering exercise. we had personally put it up. He took 180 degrees wrong direction, because he reasoned directions wrongly. Took 1,5 hours to find him. SO KEEP THAT COMPASS WITH YOU AND NOT IN THE BAG, BUT IN HAND.

lastly, because someone is going to ask this anyway. I have used plate-compasses from Silva, Suunto and Moscow compass. All are good guality stuff, as long as you dont by cheapest camper models. Meaning the cheapest models you find at normal markets.

sorry for bad english
PS: northwolf: seura?

reply to post by cavscout



Excellent points! Here is a link to FM 3-25.26 Map reading and Land Navigation for those that are interested.

Land Nav

S&F I can locate the north star no problem, but I have little to non map skills. Keep all these skills coming people, I am eating all this info up like a starving person.

Get a military compass and learn the hand to cheek and hand to chest methods of keeping point. Get you a red light flashlight also because those compasses have red light markings. Red lights are hard to see along way out and won't give up your posistion as easily as a regular light would.


The military compass is lightweight and can take a beating. I ran over one with a humvee on ashphalt and it still worked fine.

I can navigate well.

Anybody into Geocaching? I find caches with crappy printout of a topo map and a cheap plastic compass.

As far as my home territory, i've got it down. Over the years i've seen trails come and go, minor geology changes like rockfalls, and changes in foliage density. I can run on animal trails for 20 miles at nigh and know when something moved a rock or snapped a branch since the last time i've been through. I try to identify any feature that's remotely distinct and compare it to where i think i am. Over time i've built a corrected internal database that will be updated if a rock on the side of the trial two saddles from the junction gets overturned. I look at EVERYTHING when i walk and pay attention to tracks,

Speaking of tracks, that can tell you a lot. I don't have any formal training in track identification but i've learned through experience several tracking tricks.

First, know exactly what your own track looks like. this sounds kinda obvious but people have followed their own tracks around inn circles before, be aware of it.

Know what the tracks of your companions/enemies/prey/whatever looks like. I can usually tell who has been out hiking and when by what kind of tracks i see.

Pay attention to ANY tracks you see and try to "personify" them. When i go out if i see an unfamiliar human track i study any examples i can of it, size, impact, drive, stride, direction of travel and attempt to build a profile based on evidence. A hiking boot with low impact and short strides with little drive (pushing forward hard enough to scrape or distort the surface, upturning small rocks and pebbles tells me someone put some effort into forward motion)tells me someone not too heavy had been moving slow and trying to blend in. I'll look for places where the footprints break stride, stand in those prints, and try to imagine why i'd do that. Maybe i'd stand there and want to take a scenic photo, they were probably doing that. I'd also look for other sign like triangular patterns of holes in the ground that may indicate tripod use. Finding overlapping duckfooted stance and 3 holes means somebody is doing photography. Finding duckfeet in front of a bush means someone may have peed on that bush.

Repetitive marks along with footprints can also clue you in. Single small hole next to every step means someone is using a walking pole. A depression rather than a sharp hole means a walking stick rather than a ski-pole style spike.

Scrapes on the path's surface and upturned small rocks may indicate rock hunters. Small holes dug and filled back in means someone was probably metl detecting, treasur hunting. All these things can be confirmed by finding multiple instances of a track being identified with some sort of additional sign.

Also, i always leave myself subtle clues to where i've been, breaking green twigs of the same length, kicking my own rocks over, and also because i'm paranoid, i'll leave false sign by walking backwards sometimes and by leaving tracks down the path i didn't take. I'm careful in some areas to walk only on non-tracking surfaces for intermittent periods. It's more training than paranois, but i play what if when i'm out and practice being hard to track.

Lots of times i'll build a profile and be surprised at how close i was when i run into the photographer or rockhound or mushroomhunter.

Learn to figure out who has been doing what where and you'll have a decent idea of where others have been and are going. I've found a lot of neat places following others' tracks.

And reference, just study the whole horizon for distinctive marks or features. If you can identify some, call them by name, if you can't identify their names, then give them a name you'll remember and it'll help you to remember to keep track of it and also will seem more familiar and you'll be sure of your memory of it. I've got names for rocks, stumps, cliffs, washes, mineshaft, peaks, everything. Name everything around you with memorable names to remember them. Only one thing looks like buttcrack rock and that's the big rock formation that looks like a plumber's crack. And if i pointed out buttcrack rock to you, you'd laugh when you seen it and remember it for that alone, sure enough you'd be able to 100% identify buttcrack rock.

You don't really NEED to know constellations to navigate by the stars, but it helps. All you got to do is pay attention to what the sky looks like, name a few of your own constellations that you "discover" and can definitely recognize. Remember the orientation, your constellation "big mac with fries" points a certain way, the brightest star might be the easternmost one, and it'll stay that way as it crosses the sky. Also you can keep track of it in the sky just like you do the sun. It don't matter what it is as long as you can identify it. Don't try this with those stationary ufo's though or you'll get mixed up.

Whenever you're heading in any one direction, pick out a distant landmark as far out as you can and head towards it, even if you've got to deviate course youve got a referendce so you know where you need to go to correct course.

If you're near the ocean, the wind can tell you where you are in relation to the coast. During the day the land heats and you get hot air rising, displaced by cooer air from the surrounding bodies of water. Breeze blows onshore. At night and in early morning the land has cooled but the water hasn,t and the wind reverses itself and blows from land out to sea. If you know that the coast is on a north-south line you can figure on the wind blowing east and west, depending on day or night.

Those are a few tricks i use personally, but for the most part i just "know".

For my personal records I cannot navigate by the stars, being in the UK its usually cloudy so theres no point, but in my defense I can navigate fine, ovver the last 20 years since I've been driving and riding and moving around I have NEVER been lost, I may take a long route but always get to where I'm going. My Brothers got lost in the past big time , but not me, I can read a map fine by taking into account all the scenery including bridges and streams. but a good point in the thread, how many people can't find their way out of a mall carpark let alone head anywhere should the need arise?.

Disclaimer: I'm a theist but not of the Abrahamic faiths. I have minor biblical scholar and scriptural skills. Also I am not a scientific/legal or medical expert in any field. Beware of my Contagious Memes! & watch out that you don't get cut on my Occams razor.All of this is my personal conjecture and should not be considered the absolute or most definitive state of things as they really are. Use this information at your own risk! I accept no liability if your ideology comes crashing down around you with accompanying consequences!

Explanation: S&F!

I did orienteering in high school and I'm not to shabby with the plastic compasses [so cheap that you could carry several and store several more!]. I did caving around the same time and this involved a massive amount of navigation above and below ground! This is what I learned....

Know the scale of the map you are working with! Me and a friend wanted to hike to tumut from the ACT and we did a test run AFTER assessing the maps and the instant we got to the foot of the 1st climb we realized we had got the map scale wrong and a small steep slope was actually a massive 70 degree sloped rugged mountain! :shk: I'm glad we stopped because we thought there was a small creek on the otherside and its actually a large river!

Underground my uncle and I used a 100mtrs of knotted rope [knotted at 1mtr intervals] wrapped around an old plastic hand casting fishing hand reel.
We would loosely attach one end to whatever was handy [in the caves it was rocks] and just reel it out and when the line ran out it was just tug hard and reel it in! I have used this method at night in thick aussie bush and scrub over rugged mountainous terrain and its surprising how accurate it becomes when one takes into account that map distances are generally read as the crow flys so to speak [point to point] whereas distances covered on the ground specifically meet the No# of contour lines [times the legend distance between said contour lines] between the point of departure and the target point! Not many average map readers go to this level of detail when reading and assessing maps! This kind of lack of detailed oversight can lead to exactly what me and my mate ran into above! Lucky for us it was a trial run and we wern't carrying 20kgs in survival packs!

Navigation by the sky [both day and night]

Daytime: Well its obvious the sun raises in the east and sets in the west [ignoring those polar regions soz ] and if you have 48hrs to spare and clear skies then its pretty easy to basically find....

Basic East and West directions via where the sun rises and sets!

Basic Latitude via placing a long [not too long! say 2-3ft or 1/2-1mtr] stick into the ground as upright as possible and marking out the end of the sticks shadow as the sun passes overhead throughout the day and one will note that the shadow will start being very long early on and will shorten up by about midday and then growing long again in nearly the opposite direction to the morning shadow! The longer the shadow is at the midday point relates directly to how far north or south of the equator you are! Therefor a extremely short or nonexistent shadow [even with a very long stick!] means you are basically at the equator with the sun directly overhead whereas a long shadow [even with a very short stick] will tell you that you are far from the equator. The direction of the shadow will point either south [if in southern hemisphere it will point to ones right if one directly faces East!] and viceversa for the northern hemisphere!

At Night in the southern hemisphere we have the southern cross and just anticlockwise besides them are two stars called the pointers and one just draws a line directly down the main spare of the cross and at the same time draw a line from directly between the two pointers and where these two lines cross up in the sky is Appoximately the souther celestial pole! Draw a line directly from there down to the horizon and thats basically south! Note the souther cross and the two pointers and all other constelations appear to rotate about this point in the sky so sometimes the cross is to the west and the main spare points east and sometimes its upright or at some weird angle! Regardless, as long as you can see the cross and its two pointers, you'll be able to find south!

At night the moon also proceeds across the sky in an east to west fashion!

Finally I offer up what I learned reading books about british gamekeepers regarding navigation and knowing ones direction by plants, which was that moss and lichen grows only on one side of certain trees [it was oaks in the books] and I found that this was also true in the southern hemisphere [I found it on pine trees] but I wouldn't rely on this as accurate at all!

Personal Disclosure: Read the map legend 1st! Learn what diffences in scales means! Don't get lost and THROW your coke bottle GPS away!