Sarah Holland
Northern News Services

Yellowknife (July 01/02) - Once you have your personal watercraft, you may want to outfit yourself with accessories, for safety or high-tech fun.

Fish finders are the fisher's eyes and ears under the water. Fish finders range in price from around $100 to well over $1,000 and offer a variety of features.

One of the lower-priced fish finders is the Eagle Fish Easy 2. With a 160 by 100 pixel resolution and LCD display, the Fish Easy 2 takes readings up to 800 feet and a fish track displays the depth of the target.

For a more advanced and expensive fish finder, try the FCV 582L. Comes with colour LCD display, six levels of signal noise rejection and a choice of background screen colours. There are eight ranges scales to 2,500 feet and the finder reaches 5,000 feet. The FCV 582L has audio/visual alarms for pre-set water depth, water temperature or fish echoes.

Global positioning systems (GPS) are popular and useful tools to take on the water with you. Like all electronic devices, the prices vary with the brand name and options.

The Standard Horizon GPS CP 150 comes with a 12-channel receiver and 320 by 240 pixel resolution. Choose from 600 waypoints and 20 routes.

A smaller GPS is the Garmin eMAP Deluxe. This hand-held device includes an eight megabyte data card and PC cable, 500 waypoints with symbols and an internal basemap with information on North and South America, including boundaries, lakes, rivers, streams, airports, cities, towns, coastlines, food, lodging and service stations.

The Garmin eMAP Deluxe runs up to 12 hours on two AA batteries.

The Raymarine RL70 Plus Raychart will help you chart your course. With a seven-inch monochrome LCD display, the RL70 has 320 by 240 pixel resolution. It shares waypoint data, range, time to target, speed, wind, etc. Stores up to 1,000 waypoints and 20 routes. There are bearing distance and course deviation indicators and alarms for waypoint arrival, cross track error and anchor drift.

One of the course charters that's top of the line is the Raymarine RL80C Plus Raychart. With a 10.4-inch full colour LCD display, this fully integrated chart plotter stores up to 1,000 waypoints and 20 routes. Comes with port and tide information and programmable alarms.

The Vexilar hand-held depth finder is a convenient little tool. The depth is displayed digitally and shoots through ice.

Other accessories on the market include compasses, radars, radios and underwater cameras.