Crossing the Prime Meridian

This is our third time crossing the Prime Meridian in Nine of Cups. We crossed it twice before when we crossed the Atlantic from Uruguay to South Africa in 2006 and then again, when we crossed back to the USA in 2007. It's not quite as big a deal as crossing the Equator, but it deserves some recognition and a small celebration aboard.

The Prime Meridian, based at the Royal Observatory, Greenwich, London was established by Sir George Airy 1851. By 1884, over two-thirds of all ships used it as the reference meridian on charts and maps.  At the same time the French also established the Paris Meridian. When the International Meridian Conference was held in 1884 to determine which meridian would become the world “official” meridian, the Greenwich meridian was chosen. The French did not agree and for several decades France was the only country that continued to use the Paris meridian. Go figure.

Setting our clocks to GMT (Greenwich Mean Time) or UTC (Coordinated Universal Time) is pretty irrelevant at the moment and has little effect on life aboard. Sunrise and sunset are the two most important times of the day and we probably won't bother to reset our clocks till we arrive some place where it matters. More important for us … we've just moved from the eastern hemisphere to the western hemisphere and the GPS proves it.

The point at which the Equator (0° latitude) and the Prime Meridian (0° longitude) intersect, known by sailors as the Golden X,  is in the Gulf of Guinea off western Africa in the Atlantic. It is nothing more than a point of intersection for two imaginary lines. It has no geographical significance, but if you're a sailor and you sail to the Golden X, you become a Golden Shellback. Sorry, folks. We need to settle for being non-gilded shellbacks. The Golden X is too far off our route for a diversion, I'm afraid.

About the Atlantic Ocean

Since we're in the process of crossing the Atlantic, I thought it might be interesting to learn a bit more about this particular ocean. It's the second largest ocean (after the Pacific) and covers about 20% of the Earth's surface. Size-wise, it's roughly equivalent to 6.5 times the size of the USA.

The Atlantic Ocean's name derives from Greek mythology referring to Atlas the Titan. The Greeks originally considered any waters beyond the Strait of Gibraltar as Atlantis thalassa, in English, the Sea of Atlas, i.e. the Atlantic. According to Wiki, the oldest recorded reference to the “Atlantic” is mentioned in The Histories of Herodotus c. 450BC. If you remember your Greek myths, Atlas was the fellow who carried the world on his shoulders for eternity. Incidentally, the early Greeks believed that the “ocean” was an enormous river which encircled the world.

There's a submarine mountain range known as the Mid-Atlantic Ridge which extends from Iceland in the north to South Georgia Island in the south, dividing two major basins, with an average depth of  nearly 11,000' (3,340m) deep. The deepest part of the Atlantic at 28,000' (8600m) is the Milwaukee Deep near Puerto Rico. The jagged light blue line stretching vertically in this satellite image clearly shows the Mid Atlantic Ridge.

The Atlantic is the second youngest of the five oceans formed when the super-continent Pangea separated and the area between the newly formed continents filled with water … now the mighty Atlantic. You can see how Africa fits so nicely with South America … like a puzzle piece.

Though Leif Erikson is remembered as the first explorer to reach North America more than 500 years before Columbus, it was the crossing of the Atlantic by later European explorers in the Age of Discovery that was key to the development and expansion of Western civilization into the Americas.  After all, it's the Atlantic Ocean that separates the "Old World" from the "New World". Our British cruising friends always refer to crossing the Atlantic as “heading across the pond”. I read that the term “Black Atlantic” referred to the extensive Atlantic slave trade and the term “Green Atlantic” was coined to describe the Irish migration to the USA. Incidentally, it's no surprise that the Atlantic was the first ocean to be crossed by both a ship and an airplane.

So there you have it in a nutshell … all you never wanted nor needed to know about the Atlantic in one short blog post. I've obviously got quite a bit of time on my hands during this passage, huh?

Lüderitz to St. Helena - Days 5 & 6

days 5 - 6

Day 5

Miles to go: 840

Yet another gloomy, raw morning after a moonless, starless night. What's up with that? The sky is grey. The sea is grey. Blah, blah, blah! A maniacal wind god got his kicks playing with the wind velocity during the night. First it was 20 knots of wind, then 4 knots, then 20, then 7, then 25 ... all in quick succession, over and over and over. We'd wonder if we should think about reefing, then we wondered if we should get out the oars and help move us along. We're now about 20 degrees off course and thinking about poling out as the wind shifts more southeasterly. I'm sure as soon as we set out the pole, the wind will shift back again. And this was supposed to be a fast trip. Hmmm...no matter, I guess. We'll get there when we get there.

We've met only a few ships, mostly several miles off. A few Chinese fishing vessels were in our path hauling nets, but they were well clear before we passed on through.

We've settled into a routine. Three hours on, three hours off. During the days, we spend a few hours together, eating meals, chatting, talking about new book ideas and where we'll head after the Guianas. Otherwise, we nap and read and write and prepare meals and clean up. On passages, I cook and David cleans up. I consider this a vacation. We have our little daily rituals. David makes his tour of the deck each morning. So far, no major issues to report (thank, Neptune) which is somewhat incredible. I've packed away the Namibian courtesy flag and dug out the St. Helena and Q flags. I try to wipe down the cockpit daily...residual Luderitz sand, salt, and errant crew crumbs mount up if I don't stay on top of it.

We're ready for St. Helena, but still 840 miles to go. And just in case I haven't stressed it enough, it's still cold!

Day 6

Miles to go: 745

What in Neptune's name was I thinking? No major issues, I said. Doing well with power because of solar, wind and prop, I bragged. Am I freakin' crazy to have said that out loud? Written it down and actually shared it with you? Even thought the thought  it in the first place?

Shortly after posting that last blog, we rigged the pole ... which promptly collapsed and bent into a very neat 90 degree angle rendering it much less useable. It's currently lashed, rather artistically, to the mast pulpit, awaiting the captain's verdict as to what will be done. No matter, there is no wind anyway. The erratic S/SE winds calmed to a constant 5-7 knots max. Overcast skies (no solar), no wind gen output and minimal prop gen output, have all contributed to "load shedding" aboard. Bah!

We're eating lots of oranges this trip. On my last shop at OK Grocery ( it's not great, but it's OK?) in Luderitz, they had a special on oranges ... 6 kg (that's about 13# worth) for less than $3! What a deal! But that's quite a crop of oranges and it required a separate trip to the dinghy to haul them (and hanging a separate hammock to contain them all aboard). David was surprised at the volume purchase. "Scurvy", I replied ...enough said.

Now, why did that topic come up today? Well, eating oranges, at the moment, is the bright spot of the day! The skies are still grey. We've seen no whales, dolphins or Krakens. The only sea life we've seen are two stiff, dried-out, smelly squid on deck. There have been no gorgeous sunrises or sunsets ...nary a one. There is no wind to speak of and we're moving at glacial speed...not even fast enough to fish. There's no extra power, so laptop usage has been curtailed. Quite honestly, I'm getting a bit cranky. David woke from his off-watch nap and could smell the  foul humor in the air. It was that palpable.

David has been pondering the pole situation. This is not a new problem. He's worked on the whisker pole several times since Australia, usually resulting in the pole becoming useful, albeit shorter, for some indeterminate period of time, and then breaking again. We need a new pole, and it's on the wish list, but was not in the budget in Cape Town after all of our other repairs and purchases. This time he aims to remove the extension altogether (it's the weakest point) and we'll use it as a mini-whisker with a reefed foresail...better than no pole at all. That was his project this afternoon and he worked assiduously at it with good results. I marvel at his sure-footedness as he works on the deck while the boat is rocking and rolling. I'm always amazed at his solutions and how well they work out. We now have a mini-whisker, about 5m long and it seems to be working just fine.

Miracle of miracles, the sun appeared late this afternoon, as did a pod of whales. It wasn't actually warm, but it was warm-er. I soaked it up and my blue funk evaporated. David saw a green flash. Things are looking up.

Passage Days 7 & 8 coming up1