Mike, thanks for the reference to msg #283. I knew there was no way this one
hadn't been discussed before. It was indeed very neat to get out onto dry
NJPA. I've never seen the river so low and calm, and clear as well. Even two
toddlers in our group were able to wade out to the slightly detached farthest
south sandbar. Ironic that the river is so low, considering it had (I believe)
its third worst flood ever this past spring. As far as "rock trumps paper,"
that is a neat reversal of "paper covers rock."
Now if we can scissors to cut rock (other than pumice or talc), and paper to
smash scissors, we can set up our own BoundaryPoint version of the old
scissors-paper-rock game.
Mike S.
In a message dated 7/6/05 5:02:16 AM,
BoundaryPoint@yahoogroups.com writes:
<< Date: Tue, 5 Jul 2005 18:31:09 -0700 (PDT)
From: aletheia kallos <
aletheiak@...>
Subject: Re: NJ-NY-PA
nice one mike
& we do indeed have a long history here with njnypa
but i am glad to see the trying & the pointing are so
alive & well there
for in fact we have been aware of the probable error
in the usgs topo since at least
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/BoundaryPoint/message/283
along with the several other likely tristate errors
noted alongside it
so your finding even such a glaring discrepancy as you
have found here is in itself not necessarily a
complete show stopper
& since the tri states rock is supported by the nearby
njny witness monument in the attached pix stipulating
to its authenticity & position
i dont think we have to detain ourselves very long
over the usgs error
for clearly the rocks must trump the paper
& after all these years
i am no longer able to vouch for the exact dimensions
inscribed on the witness monument
but it appears to say
south 64 degrees west 82 feet from this is the tri
states rock
which is the nw end of njny & the north end of njpa
&
the nypa corner is in the center of the river 276 feet
due west of the tsr
however
the angle of nypa shown on the topo & on the tsr
itself dont support this testimony from the witness
rock
hahaha
yikes
for both show nypa bearing wnw from the tsr to this
first turnpoint
so
that particular detail at least does appear to involve
a clear discrepancy
which is indeed etched in both stone & paper
my guess is that the due west bearing mentioned on the
witness rock trumps the slightly stylized depiction of
that convergent line on the tsr
& that nypa should thus angle closer to njpa in the
diagram on the tsr as well as on the topo depiction
also
somewhat mitigating the usgs error
we have in fact found the tristates rock isolated from
the peninsula & even completely submerged at times
making a wet point of njnypa at least in flood stage
more or less as depicted
still there is no reason to have much confidence in
the geodetic position indicated for the trifinium on
the topo
nor in commercial gps receivers at less than 100 foot
range anyway
or so i would guess
tho i am not a gps maven by any stretch
extreme congrats on the careful try in any case
& for all the interesting observations
you are the first known visitor to have ever walked
out onto the delaware bed
tho there is lots of dry denj to walk
this is the only known reach of dry njpa
---
spookymike@... wrote:
> I revisited NJNYPA on July 4. I had always wondered
> about the apparent
> discrepancy between the placement of "tri-state
> rock" on bedrock at the tip of the
> peninsula and the positioning on the topo, which
> shows the point out in the
> river. I used topozone to
> identify (NAD 27) coordinates for the point in the
> river and the tip of the
> peninsula.
>
> Trifinium:
>
http://topozone.com/map.asp?z=18&n=4578239&e=525470&s=25&size=s&u=1&layer=DRG2
5
>
> Tip of Peninsula:
>
http://topozone.com/map.asp?z=18&n=4578244&e=525506&s=25&size=s&u=1&layer=DRG2
5
>
> Standing atop tri-state rock, GPS placed the
> trifinium some 100 feet further
> south into the river, fortunately accessible this
> day because the river was
> low and two sand bars extended south from the tip of
> the peninsula. Once I
> walked out to the farthest sand bar, GPS said I was
> about 40 feet from the
> trifinium, which is about as close as my Garmin
> Summit unit ever gets to pre-entered
> waypoints before it starts
> "wandering."
>
> These results seem to bear out the position of the
> trifinium as being out in
> the river, as shown on the map, rather than at
> tri-state rock. If this has
> already been beat to death, my apologies, but does
> anyone have any answers to
> this apparent discrepancy?
>
> Mike Schwartz
>