TravelTalkOnline Forums Travel and Vacation Forums British Virgin Islands Chart Plotter

Our boat is coming with a Chart Plotter. It is a B&G. I have been chartering in the BVI many years and never had one. I have a Garmin hand held with blue charts and Walkers waypoints to get me to Anegada. Never had a problem. I looked on youtube and it was mentioned you need maps. Navionics etc. Do you plotters come with the charts installed our do you need them on your handheld (phone ipad?). Does anyone use them if they have been to the BVI's a few times. What is the feedback? use or not use Thanks in advance.

The chart plotter will have the maps you need. You can still bring your hand held as a backup but I doubt you will even turn it on.

I regularly use my iPad with Navionics in spite of having chart plotters on board

I wondered about that. If you know where you are going and have been there really do not see the use. I have a current VI guide just use that and the handheld for the Anegada approach and the trip from Anegada to Jost.

The big uses for chart plotter when you know where you are going is.
-- actual boat speed
-- to answer the question....when will get there?

And to measure distance. It's also convenient to carry the chart plotter around if desired.

I was told that the charts going into Anegada were about 300' off. Don't know if this is still true.

In my experience that is untrue. In any case, by staying significantly west of the channel entrance, you should see the red and green marking the channel well before proceeding into the channel.

Agree it is the red and green market that I look for. Last time I was there some of the channel markers weren't there so you had to be careful. Probably replaced by now. Before gps and all the other stuff walker had a great article on the approach with pictures and explanations. I still have that plastic laminated in a notebook somewhere. He even warned about the 2 kt set on the way over. Was great.

Like I said, add an adequate margin of safety to the west.

I bring my own Android tablet with Navionics and use it almost exclusively.

We use both the plotter and the tablet at Anegada though, just to be sure. They always seem to agree.

So for the folks using Navionics on an iPad or tablet, is the iPad directly attached to the internet or attached to a hotspot or mifi?

We've had trouble keeping internet access to keep the navionics working once we leave a harbor. Most boats have had a chart plotter we've used successfully but I'd love to have the backup but haven't been able to make it reliable under sail.

Wifi is not necessary. iPhones and cellular capable iPads have an internal GPS. I don't know about Android tablets, but the app will not function with a wifi only iPad although you could purchase an external gps like bad elf or similar.