Hi Rick, I just bought the Garmin GPSMap 276c. I got the land and sea package. I can give you lots of reasons why this is good & bad. (Another time) But... First. The innexpensive hand helds have a storage problem. I used to have the Garmin Map 76s. I bought the Blue Chart CD and was able to D/L only about 60% of the San Francisco Bay. Since I may launch from any of dozens of choices, I need the entire bay (at least). The built in storage that you download to is only, I believe, 8 or 16 mb. (you should visit Garmins site for the facts). Anyway, after spending what I thought was alot. It didn't work. I sold it all on Ebay. I've also got a laptop. So, theoreticly I could have erased and added maps on demand. But, I like the idea of map in the memory. The base maps that are included will give only the highlights of areas, but not the nav. details one would like and will likely need. So, I think the handheld GPS Map units units are okay and useful , but... there could be a storage issue, depending upon your sailing grounds.. Read on if you want... The Map 276c is $1200.00 (aaaaugh), for the land & sea package. It gives me the unit, A/C charger, 12v lighter plug in, 3 different mounts, a Blue Chart CD and a City Select land CD. Lastly it comes with a 128 mb data card (proprietary). My data card has the equivalent of 256 paper maps on the card. This covers Land roads, routes & directions for 1/2 of Oregon, California and 1/2 of Nevada. And on the same card is all of the nav aid info you could ever want from the middle of Oregon all the way down past acupulco, MX. (Buy additional data cards to add more area) I have D/L'd The Entire North American Roads map, and West Coast Blue Carts Map in the computer. Instructions say you can upload to the same unit but, can only upload to one other device. And then the program wont allow it. I haven't tried it... but since it's in my computer, I must have D/L'd instructions as well. Downloading to device is password protected... or was the first time. Chart plotters do just that, allow you to plot routes, as you look at the map. You can select a destination by spelling it out, or by location (long & lat) or by going to it on the map and putting the curser on it and pushing a button. If it has 2 legs or 20 legs in the route you must plot each leg. By pushing the "Navigate" button, on the road it will tell you verbally how to get to a place or, you can see written instruction on the screen, or you watch the curser (Your car) move on the map as if by magic... even better, if you miss a turn, because you weren't paying attention to your unit... it will take up new directions for you as you screw it up. On the water... I can't tell you yet... I'll save that for someone else or when I can. Help any? I'm just learning all that mine can do. Pretty cool technology. Bill