Monday, April 7. High cloud, temperate, calm seas.
Tomorrow morning we are in the remote island of St Helena, [we get ashore by tender], one of the more remote islands in the world. It is located 1/3 of the way out to sea from Africa towards South America, about 700 miles south of the equator, basically out in the middle of nowhere. St. Helena is a British Oversea Territory. Obviously it is financed and supported by the UK government who likes to have these little places around the world, like The Falklands for strategic purposes, as does the US and France.
St Helena was the island that the British exiled Napoleon to, and he spent the last years of his life and was buried here. Somewhat later he was exhumed and moved with great pomp and ceremony to Paris, where he now rests triumphantly.
The island is supplied by a ship specifically built for that purpose, the RMS St. Helena. My very good friend in England, Ian, was the project manager for the building of the ship, I remember him telling of some of the issues involved in its construction. It would appear that the RMS St. Helena plays a very big part of the life of the island. Its sole purpose is to sail between Cape Town, St. Helena and Ascension, which is another still more remote island some several hundred miles further north. These two islands are a bit like Easter Island and Pitcairn in the Pacific, remote and many hundreds of miles from the next island
There is an airport scheduled to be built in St. Helena in 2016 ending some of the island's isolation and no doubt opening the place up to somewhat more frequent visitors by tourists and relatives of the island. The current population is reported to be around 3800 souls.
I appear to have a mission tomorrow and that is to find and photograph the one metre long scale model of the St. Helena that my friend Ian transported in his car before it was presented to, I can only assume, the owners of the ship who hopefully have it on display somewhere.
The other oft done thing on the island is take the 699 steps up the Jacob's Ladder near the town to the surrounding peak. There is apparently only one suitable landing spot on the island and the town is situated there, on the level spot, as the land then rises up to the towering peaks around it.
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This is day 93, as you may know. We have 20 days to go and there seems to be a bit of resolve, or at least a different attitude with the passengers on board. We have been to some pretty exciting and wonderful ports on this cruise. The last one, Cape Town, was anticipated and looked forward to by many if not most of the passengers, and crew. We are now basically Homeward Bound, yes, we have some neat ports and exciting days ahead, but the 'bloom is off the rose' so as to speak, from my point of view at least. I for one am attending some not-too-exciting lectures just to keep busy and my reading hours are skyrocketing. Today at a lecture in the balcony, many were fast asleep, putting in time.
Also today we received some information about taking tours in Fort Lauderdale for those with late afternoon airplane departures heading home. Soon we will be thinking about packing all this stuff back into cases again…
Nautical terms in everyday usage.
Three sheets to the wind. A sheet is a rope that controls the tension on the downwind side of a square sail. If, on a three-masted ship, the sheets are loose, the ship will stagger and wander aimlessly, it is Three Sheets to the Wind.
Pic.
- Compliments of Ian, this ad appeared in The Daily Telegraph this weekend.
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