To the editor: Further to your recent item on iPad navigation using the Bad Elf GPS capability (iPad navigation around Hatteras, issue #199, January/February 2012), as a delivery skipper I have been using this combination on my iPad MK 1 for the last 12 months. I made mine waterproof by keeping the whole thing in an Aquapac with no ill effects or loss of functionality. Well, almost none, since you have to take it out to recharge it. I had a younger crewmember who told me I would wear out the battery on my iPad if I charged it 24/7 — this was after 10 days at sea!
Anyhow the reason I am writing, is that instead of iNavX, I have been using the Navionics HD apps for charts, available directly from iTunes at £30 ($48) each. Initially these were potentially brilliant, as you could even download and overlay the GRIB files on them when you were in Wi-Fi range, but store them so that you kept the information, ideal for crossing Biscay or the Adriatic. However, with each upgrade Navionics has, unfortunately, reduced this flexibility.
—Tony Agar lives in Cheddar, U.K. He became an instructor for Sunsail in 1996 and later with the United Kingdom Sailing Academy. He also delivers both motor and sailing yachts throughout the Atlantic, Europe and the Mediterranean. Agar started the Anchorage Sea School which offers the entire range of Royal Yachting Association practical courses.
