Dan Foster

I've been kayak fishing with a friend from Marblehead for the last two summers. I'd definitely be up for some kayak fishing trips, and can contribute my extensive knowledge as to where the fish *aren't* in the Marblehead/Salem Harbor area. If anyone wants to come inland this summer, I'd be happy to host an evening of paddleboard or kayak fly fishing for panfish and bass in our backyard pond.

What month would you suggest for an on-water Boston Harbor navigation paddle? I suspect everyone who has chimed in so far is comfortable with early-season paddling, but there may be advanced beginners who'd be happier paddling in warmer conditions. I've floated the idea of a day-long navigational adventure during May's Jewell Island camping trip to a few people, since that would allow for a good mix of instruction and trip planning, on-water nav, and land-based nav.

Good suggestions. As a first step, I'm trying to gauge interest and see what level of detail there's the most demand for. Here's another question for the group: If you were to attend a navigation workshop or on-water practice in 2017, would you prefer an introductory, intermediate or advanced curriculum for yourself?

I'm organizing a navigation workshop for NSPN, most likely on a Saturday in early April. I'd like to hear your ideas about what topics you'd like to see covered, what skills you'd like to improve, what kinds of exercises you'd like to do, and what kinds of navigational challenges you've faced in the past. You can reply here, or send me a private message.

I came up with mostly the same answers as Gary. For #3, I took a different route back to Hell's Half Acre: cove to N of Potato, to S of Camp, threading the needle (high tide!) straight back to Hell's Half Acre. I use a different technique for determining GPS waypoints off of a chart: Find two chart lines that lie on either side of the point. Let's assume they are horizontal lines of latitude N44deg 08' and N44deg 09'. Take a plastic ruler and place the 0cm mark on the lower line, and rotate the ruler until the 10cm mark hits the upper line. (cm are unimportant, you can use inches or anything with 10 equal spaces). Now slide the ruler until it hits the point. Let's say it hits at 7.2 centimeters. That means that the point is 7.2 tenths of the distance from the lower line to the upper line, or 72%. 72% of the distance from N44deg 08' to N44deg 09' is a latitude of N44deg 08.72' Repeat for longitude. Works best with UTM coordinates, since everything is in base 10. Here's the view from #5. Blue line points to Camp I, red points to Devil I.

The other ambiguity in the original coordinates was the lack of datum. If someone had plotted those coordinates on a USGS topo map, they might have plotted them assuming you used the NAD27 datum, which was the the standard on all US maps up until 1983, and still shows up a lot in current maps and charts that were originally produced before 1983. The most notorious local example is National Geographic 2013 edition of their waterproof "chart" of the Boston Harbor Islands, which touts being "regularly updated" with GPS coordinates and a UTM grid, but you have to read the fine print on the back of the map to realize they are still using NAD27 (the North American Datum of 1927). The lat/lon values reported by everyone's phones, and by most GPS receivers and software (assuming you haven't selected a different datum), reference the WGS84 datum. There's a significant offset between the two datums, which means if someone gives you coordinates in NAD27 and you interpret them as WGS84 (or vice versa), you'll be off by about 150 feet in New England. In several other coordinate systems (Massachusetts state plane, for example), they added in a huge fixed number to any coordinates expressed in the new datum, so that if you mixed up datums, you'd end up with results that were hundreds of miles away, making the error immediately obvious. So, for clarity, I'd do everything that Gary suggests above, and then tack on "WGS84 datum" at the end, or "all coordinates in degrees and minutes of latitude and longitude, WGS84 datum" somewhere near the list of coordinates.

Bonus question #7: Gary's coordinates could lead you to four different locations depending on how you interpreted them. (I'm going to change his example slightly to make the second issue more ambiguous: “68.38.37W 44.07.15N” ). List them, and explain the two things you can do differently when writing or radioing latitudes and longitudes to avoid these errors.

It's looking like another warm Wednesday for paddling this week, and the foliage should be just about perfect along the local shorelines. Would anyone be interested in a foliage paddle along the Concord or Sudbury rivers in lieu of our regular Walden Pond practice? I'm up for anything, from a full-day, 20 mile downstream run, to a 2-3 hour out-and-back in the Concord area.

Here's the Walden calendar listing, which has a map and directions: http://www.nspn.org/forum/calendar/event/1066-walden-pond-skills-and-stupid-kayak-tricks/

I'll be there at 2PM to join the rest of the gang.

Another balmy Wednesday awaits, and the surf report is showing perfect conditions at Walden Pond ahead of Hurricane Matthew. I'll be there at 2PM to join the rest of the gang.

I will also be there this afternoon. What a great day to be on the water!

If at least one other person posts that they are going, I will be there working on speedy rescues from 3:30 til 6.

I am planning to be at Walden tonight to work on rescues. I won't be able to attend next Wednesday.

I will be at Walden tonight. I'm planning to work on rescues and rolls. Hope to see some others there!

Bill, I'm sorry to hear you ended up paddling alone last night at Walden. I had a dinner conflict last night and was never planning to be there. Earlier in the day it looked like plenty of people were going, so I didn't want to post "not-going" and scare anyone off. It seems like attendance at our Walden sessions has declined from when I started showing up a few years ago. I'd certainly like to keep the weekly sessions going next year. The "show and go" format only works well when enough people show up each week. When attendance starts dropping to 1-3 people each week, not knowing if anyone else will be there gives a strong incentive to not show up, and the downward cycle continues. I'd suggest that we start encouraging everyone to RSVP for each weekly session, and if there aren't two RSVPs by 4PM on Wednesday afternoon, we post the session as cancelled. For 2017, I'd suggest that we consider spinning the pond sessions off into a new meetup group, or open the Walden sessions up to AMC WW, AMC SK, or other local paddling meetups if there isn't enough interest from NSPN members to keep a weekly session going.

I'm heading over to Walden shortly, as well.

Pru, come to Walden next Wednesday and we'll have you rolling in no time. Bring a goose decoy if you have one.

It was free when I registered through BoatUS in April 2015. Too bad they aren't offering this free service any more.

I will be there tonight.

I registered through Boat US. I left everything blank except the fields below. I think if the Coast Guard gets a DSC alert from a vessel called Kayak, they'll probably figure out what they need to know pretty quickly. I originally was going to name my vessel Orange 17' Kayak, but since I sometimes paddle a green one, I left it as Kayak. Vessel Name: Kayak Vessel Wireless Telephone or Cell #1: [My cell #] Ship Classification: * Unspecified Vessel Location (Marina Name or Residence):* Stow, MA Capacity (# of persons expected to be on board): * 1 Remarks: Kayaking along MA and ME coastal waters

I'm going to follow Pru's lead and stay clear of Walden tonight.

I plan to be there on Wednesday. I'm hoping to work on traditional stick and goose decoy rolls, which should provide plenty of rescue opportunities!

This was an easy decision for me to make, because the decision-making process happened back at the beginning of the season, when I set for myself a list of conditions I won't paddle in (unless it's required to get back to a safer location). Sustained winds over 20 in tomorrow's forecast means no sea kayaking for me, despite how much I'd like to attend or how easy it would be to start down a slippery slope. Stay safe tomorrow.

Tomorrow's "breezy" forecast seems to be getting breezier... Sunday Mostly sunny, with a high near 68. Breezy, with a west wind 15 to 20 mph increasing to 20 to 25 mph in the afternoon. Winds could gust as high as 40 mph.