| By :
Roger Brown
In the last 10 years, as GPS has come into its own, there've been a wealth of opportunities to open up for people that love the outdoors to get around and make things a lot easier. Safety and maneuverability has been greatly enhanced with altitude watches combined with GPS functions. In the world of the past, you needed to be part Lewis and Clark to be successful at navigating in and out of the woods, but with altitude watches and GPS signals guiding the way, the average guy can make it out of the woods without event. It is always wise to have a backup system no matter what you are doing. Your primary equipment will always be your map and your compass, but knowing you have a system like this on your arm that backs up the whole thing is just a strong extra level of safety. The way altitude watches work is in one of two ways: * If there is no GPS technology onboard, then the watch gets its elevation information from a barometric pressure sensor. * If there is a GPS in the watch, then it will sense altitude without aid of a barometer. The barometer sensor will directly read the pressure of the outside air. That number is then translated into an altitude reading. These altitude watches need to be calibrated relatively often. The reason for that is they get out of adjustment basically every time the humidity or temperature changes very much. The way to adjust the watch's altimeter and calibrate it to read accurately where you are right now is to find a point of known elevation and take the time to set your watch to that. You need to be prepared to do that several times a day if you want your altimeter reading to be accurate. GPS's don't really need to be calibrated since all they are doing is receiving the data sent by satellites. They seek out the several satellites that are closest and are producing the strongest signal at the moment. For an altimeter GPS watch with this type of functionality you can expect to pay anywhere from $200-$500 for most products on the market now. Depending on what you are after, you can certainly get watches with a lot of additional functions too. But, there is no need to cloud the issue with bells and whistles you will never likely use. Altitude watches with GPSs are a complicated piece of equipment, without a doubt. The more functions you have on a watch, the more likely one of them is to break. Therefore, make sure the functions you choose are matched to the type of outdoor activity you are going to be doing.
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