How to Use Tennessee Landforms Part 2

How to Use Tennessee Landforms-- Part 2-- The More Advanced User

Dana Koogler 

Thursday August  23. 2018

Tennessee Landforms Database 

   I wrote a recent tutorial on How to Use Tennessee Landforms.  It is a database that catalogs all the 

various land features in the state of Tennessee providing gps coordinates and maps to help locate them.  It is a helpful tool for those who like to explore or adventure.   I wrote it because while I am

pretty adroit at using it .. I have had a long time to practice.  I kept that first blog tutorial very basic.

It is not good to overwhelm folks with the $1 version when all they need right now is 50 cents. 

   I ran across touch points in writing that jumped out at me as being helpful, but for another category

of user.  Either beginners who after getting acclimated will soon move on to more in depth uses or hardcore map geeks like me.

You can bet if I can do it.. it isn't that hard.   I went back through that entry and pulled out the salient points that could be expounded upon.   I hope for you explorers, adventurers and map geeks you will find this fun and useful.  

How GPS Works

  GPS stands for Global Positioning System. GPS works like this. You turn the unit on and it will generally say "Acquiring Satellites" as it warms up.    It will communicate with them by bouncing radio signal between the unit and the satellites.   GPS uses triangulation but it uses four satellites to

measure position in 3D.  All the satellites clocks are set to exactly the same time.  Each satellite knows its exact position because of the system controllers inputting information.  Each satellite transmits its position and time stamp.  The signals arrive at the receiver delayed by the distance traveled.   The difference in distance traveled make each satellite appear to have a different time.

The receiver or GPS unit calculates the distance to each satellite and can then calculate its own position.   If you are holding the unit that is also YOUR position on the globe.

  GPS Coordinates

  There are numerous types of GPS coordinates or waypoints.  The easiest and most common to use
is decimal degrees. That would look like this.
36.499400,-84.653060 Angel Falls Arch in Big South Fork 

On Tennessee Landforms to the top right it has a box with numerous types of GPS coordinates for 
different systems and even a conversion tool.  

Looking at the box the digital degrees is up top. Right is latitude and left entry is longitude. 
Next below that is Degrees decimal minutes.. we used that for a long time simply because that was what our Garmin GPS unit was set up for originally.  It is rather outdated. 
Below that is Degrees minutes seconds. 
Finally at the very bottom is UTM .. which stands for Universal Transverse Mercator 
this is used by the military.   
FEMA uses something called USNG system or United States National Grid. 
I have a limited understanding of the last two.  I can say they are very useful in narrowing down a search to a very small area say within the space of a parking spot!  That is pretty accurate.

You can change most GPS units to use various waypoints and I'll try to get into that further down the tutorial. Both decimal degrees and degrees decimal minutes can be plugged into Google maps as a location.  Inputting degrees decimal minutes is harder and takes a bit of practice to get it to work.  You put in one wrong mark and you'll get a "Cannot Parse This Location" error message.
Ask Brian Solomon if you doubt me. 😊

WGS84
36.499400	-84.653060
36° 29.964'N	84° 39.184'W
36° 29' 57.8"N	84° 39' 11"W
16S 710200E 4041903N
convert to NAD27

Angel Falls Arch 35x15

 

How To Pull Waypoints from Google Maps & Cal Topo 

  Once you get to reading maps and exploring you may want to zero in on some obscure spot.

How are you going to know exactly how to reach it if there is no trail or road?  Having the GPS coordinates for it will surely help.   It is possible to lift coordinates directly from Google maps and Cal Topo if you know how.  You may have to convert them if your GPS unit does not use decimal degrees, but I'll tell you how to do that in the next section.    

    Let's say you think there is a waterfall at a certain spot on a stream because you looked at the satellite view and there is a stream with lots of white water.  Looking at the terrain makes you believe even more strongly that there should be a waterfall there.   Let's figure out how you can go check to see if you're right.  Go to the spot on Google maps where you think the falls should be.  Left click over it with your mouse. It will bring up a tiny gray and white marker.  Down below it on the map will appear a box and in faint gray lettering will be the waypoints for that exact spot.   Copy it by either writing it down or by copy/paste.  (Left click to highlight it.  Right click to bring up copy and then left click on copy)  Paste it to wordpad or whatever you want to print it out or save it.
Until you enter it into your GPS unit. 

For doing this with Cal Topo it is a little harder.  Cal Topo is harder to tell if you have the marker taken right where you want and then vet it (double check it) later.   We'll discuss Vetting waypoints on down the line in this tutorial.  

Bring up Cal Topo and enter where you want to search. Black Creek Oneida TN

When it comes up look at the creek and say you see where you believe a falls exists.  The cursor on Cal Topo is a tiny white hand.   Move it over the spot you need.  Leave it there.  Look over to the upper right of the map. The top number is decimal degrees waypoint to use.   Copy that down. I have never had any luck getting Cal Topo to copy cut paste for me.  I don't know why.

Just write the number down or enter it in your GPS unit.   

Waypoint Conversion

   Before I knew how to change our GPS unit to where it would automatically use decimal degrees I taught myself to convert waypoints from one type to another.  I am not mathmatizer so I used an app to do this.    I never have to do it now, but it is good to know how in a pinch.

Lots of apps out there can do this for you, but the simplest one I found was 

Boulter GPS Converter

Open Boulter and the box at the top .. plug in whatever waypoints you want converted. Click convert and map. Let's say its back in the days when I was having to do this prior to changing our GPS unit to decimal.   I'd plug in the decimal degrees 36.499400  -84.653060 and in my case I needed them converted to degrees/decimal minutes  it comes out looking like this 

GPS

Latitude	Longitude
N 36 29.964	W 84 39.184

 Once I got them converted on Boulter I could look at the map and see if they were where they should be.  If they should up right on the map I was set to use them.
If you are using another app you will want to double check the waypoint after converting it.
And that leads me to the next topic.

Vetting Way Points

    Any time I converted waypoints, pulled them off a map or got them from someone else... I always plug them in on a map.  Way points on Tennessee Landforms are already vetted so I usually don't check them first. I will already have studied the map and done plenty of looking to see if it is valid.
If I pull a waypoint off google maps or whatever.. I take time to plug them back in on another map to see what happens.  Let's say I pulled coordinates off someone's website  giving me directions for how to reach Grassy Knob Lookout Tower.  I would take those waypoints and insert them in the search box on Google maps to see if they take me to the right area.
If you plug these waypoints into the search box they will work fine.

N 36.387222° W 084.611389°--Decimal degrees
N 36° 23.233' W 084° 36.683' Degrees minutes seconds  will also work fine in this form
 N 36° 23.233' W 084° 36.683 degrees decimal minutes are also fine.

If you insert these you must put them in as shown OR you may use decimal degrees plugged in like so.

36.387222 -084.611389 

If you plug them in some other way.. it will not be able to figure out where you are and give you a white screen or unable to parse this location error.   

example of the WRONG way to use them 

36.387222° W 084.611389° inserted will result in Maps can't find 36.387222° W 084.611389°

This is case sensitive. Like passwords can be touchy about making sure to use all lower case or caps. They must be EXACTLY right.    What did I do wrong inserting the above waypoint?  Left off the N for North.

Also if you are NOT going to use N and W you must insert the minus sign - between the latitude and longitude to make it work.  Easy mistake to make.

Fun Things--Getting More Out of Your Adventures

   I have looked over the blog entry thus far and that seems like a pretty good second chunk of

knowledge to absorb and digest.  I think I'll wrap this blog entry up here with something light.

I'll write a third part to get the rest of it.   Nothing puts me off quicker than trying to absorb too

much at once.   It can be rather dry and make you wonder why you wanted to read this stuff or learn it in the first place.

Second Pre-Trip Review of Nearby Landforms List 

   One  easy and fun pointer for using Tennessee Landforms is to remind the user to review

the Nearby Landforms a second time after you've been through it once.   Give it a break and before your trip go back and look at it again.   It sounds silly, but you might be surprised.   I found I became

a little over confident and would see the name of some feature on the list and in my head think "oh I have looked that over before. It didn't look too thrilling." Sometimes I'd be right, but sometimes I'd be very surprised!   New photos may have been added that show a land feature to be far more interesting that I had believed. I might be confusing it with something else.  I have found out there were two falls in a given area that had such similar names they were off by one letter!  Maybe I'd seen the one already, but not the other.   

Seeking  Additional Info on Listed Landforms

  Another great way to find out if places are really worth visiting is to seek other sources of info

on them outside Tennessee Landforms.  It stands to reason that 1. If the places are really great they 

will be visited by others and there should be more photos or videos or trip reports out there.  and 2. if you are one of the folks who likes obscure locations any info you do find on it while limited may be

provided by folks like yourself who will take great photos, videos, or write up trip reports etc. on the super cool out of the way spots.   

Some excellent places to start are Flickr photo where you could find images of a spot by doing a search for them.  

You Tube--search for videos of places.  Some folks will add drone footage or video journals of places they visit.  It has turned out to be a far better source of info than I'd ever believed.

Facebook is another surprising source of info.  I have found some very out of the way stuff on there!

You may find an individual or a group or page or community that can provide you with photos, videos or directions how to reach something you want to see.

Google maps can be an excellent source of info just by itself.  Google tags and includes photos of lots of interesting areas and features. Always worth taking a quick look.

Broaden Your View of Maps 

   I will look at an entry on Tennessee Landforms and go through all the steps I have discussed
in this entry and in part 1.  It is still a good idea when you are in the map view to zoom in and out a bit using the + and - signs. Why?  I was looking for info on Skull Creek Falls in Big South Fork area the other night.  I was zooming in and out in Cal Topo view and shifting the map position around by dragging it.   I zoomed out and very plainly spelled out a little further east of where I was looking was  Grassy Knob Lookout Tower.   I had never even heard of this before!  In all my browsing and
using this database and others that had eluded me!   The point is that lots of cool stuff is written on the map to recognize and go see while you're in the area. It is a lot for anyone to take in all at once.
Just play around with it and look, look again!   It is a fun and interesting hobby.  Half the fun
of trips is in the planning and anticipation. 

Once you know of a features existence and name you can do a google search for additonal info on it.
I now know that tower exists, where it is, what it looks like, history about it, and that it was added to the National Registry of Historic Sites.