North
From KayakWiki
North - the direction to the North Pole.
In navigation, one has to be aware of several terms that refer to north:
- True North - the direction to the North Pole
- Magnetic North - this is the direction a compass points. The magnetic north pole is in the Canadian Arctic and is moving constantly. Because of this change, charts will include a correction factor for magnetic declination as well as for annual changes of the declination.
- Grid North - the direction of the north-south lines on a map or chart. Since the chart is flat and the Earth is not, mapping the details of the Earth's surface to a flat chart result in some distortion. The distortion in the direction of the lines that represent a north-south direction result in grid north not being parallel to true north in every instance.
