The advantages of paper nautical charts.

Some veteran mariners love to open a paper nautical chart, spread it out on the chart table and
enjoy a cup of coffee while planning a sail. Some seafarers doing that at home on our lanai table
picking out water depths in exotic places and imagining the anchoring and diving and what the
places and people look like. Requires no power or computer to do it.

If we ask some retire Seafarers they fascinated with charts and navigation ever since pulling my first
watch as a "deck ape" on the bridge of a destroyer in the early 60s.

They think like paper charts as a backup to electronic navigation and have collected charts they
have kept one of each to use when I circumnavigate. From time to time I pull them out from their
hiding place (an old trunk) and look at them. Something I can hold in my hand and place on a table.

Disadvantages:

Get out of date. Nav aids move or change. I think the newest I have is 1989.

They get moldy and mildewed if not kept in a dry place. A stack of charts 3 feet high weighs a lot and
takes up a lot of space.

Summary:

The paper chart will work as a backup to electronics. They don't require power or a computer and
never need new batteries or recharging. If they get splashed with seawater or get stepped on or
thrown off the chart table they don't go belly up on me. I can always update them with a notice to
mariners.

Besides, for me there is a great deal of nostalgia and memories of how seafarers or adventurers of
old days navigate. Some good and some not but always fascinating.