foxmoth,
- unfortuneatly, I did not learn to navigate VFR, because nobody took the trouble teaching me a consistent method. So, I had to think up a method that worked for me (and subsequently my students).
No, the idea is not to sweat - but to keep working. How much effort you put into the work is up to yourself & level of experience. But after having taught VFR navigation for some years now, I see a pattern in why students get lost : they spend too much time thnking procedures, using advanced plotting gadgets or using 1-in-60 rules.
The point was : once you know how to navigate, it's easy. The flow, the way you look at the terrain, it all comes naturally. But if you are just learning navigation, you must put 95% of your energy into reading - as it was put (and very well at that) by reading from map to terrain. It's a question about priorities: keep navigating! Once you see that next terrain feature of yours, you gain a 30-40 sec. loophole that is used for flightlog, checklists, communication, fuel & system checks etc.. Once you are out of navigation - get into the map again and have a look at what you can expect to see next.
In my humble experience, if you navigate in 3-4 km. flight vis. and have 3-4 min. between taking consicously care of navigation, your CEP becomes too great, i.e. you have a good chance of ending up just out of sight of your chcekpoint. The idea is to distinguish between checkpoints in the terrain and waypoints in the flightlog. You should not need to attend to the flightlog more than once every 10-20 min. - but the checkpoints need constant attention. If you need to pass over or near a big city or coastline feature to navigate - then your personal WX minima will remain high (and not a bad word about that).
But if you put an effort into precission navigation every time (+/- 1 NM either side of track), also during CAVU conditions, you stand a far better chance of dealing with bad WX should you - God forbid - stick you neck too far out just once.
How NOT to navigate, foxmoth, is the way that gets you lost. What that might be is a personal choice. But one thing I am willing to bet on : the correct degree of detail, the less your chances of getting lost. Don't overdo it - but don't do like the majority of those students that I've come across - underdoing it.
Brgds,
Ivan