Thanks to the PUP participants that shared their thoughts on Celestial Navigation skills as a backup to relying completely on GPS. I did some more research to find out just how likely it is that the US Govt would ever "Turn OFF" the GPS system. Fortunately this is a good time to do this research, because the govt just published a position paper on the topic: http://www.navcen.uscg.gov/cgsic/geninfo/FactSheet.pdf In summary, the govt has come to the realization that a great number of people and systems have a critical reliance on GPS. This includes shipping lines, pilots, the military, police, and rescue workers (the list is endless). They know they have to develop specific strategies on prevent GPS from being used against us by terrorists, but that "turning it off" isn't a very good option. So, off they go to develop a set of practices, procedures and policies in this regard. I'm 99.9% confident that IF the GPS system was ever turned of, it would be for a very short period of time, and even then it's pretty unlikely. Since 90% of a circumnavigation is spent away from the US, if it's shutdown here, the impact to me might be minimal anyway? This led me to believe I didn't need to develop the Celestial Navigation skills, except for one thought: Lightning. Sure I can keep a spare laptop and gps in the Faraday cage, but why not have a completely manual backup? I'm going to schedule a class, and see if I can maintain the skills. I figure if people have been learning to do this for hundreds of years, and I can't, maybe I would fail the Darwin test out on the ocean? Again, thanks to those of you that shared your thoughts, Oh, I did take some other thoughts way from this research: It might be very difficult to tell if the GPS signal has been degraded, and your current charteplotter position may be way, way off. Another reason to keep hourly plots on a paper chart! It is valuable to be able to start doing DR from a known last good position, perhaps from your last hourly plot on your paper chart? Having a PC program to show me stars and do sight reductions might not be wise, if this is the backup your relying on for complete failure of the PC system, maybe paper materials or a PDA is better? I guess those chart drawers under the honey bunk on the Nordhavn 43 will come in handy after all? Scott Bulger Knot@Work, 31' Camano Email: scottebulger@comcast.net