Shooting stars

22 February 2013

Every day the barometer lowers and the wind declines a bit. We can feel that we enter the Inter Tropical Convergention Zone, the Doldrums. Infamous in the old days for windlessness and heavy thunderstorms. We haven’t had any thunderstorms, but the wind decreases and so does our speed. Still we are having a great time on board. 
Gert, on of our guests, explains: “Modern times with GPS seem to rule the way navigation is performed today. During the beginning of Oosterschelde’s life, crossing the ocean was done using a compass, a sextant and a chronometer. Besides the captain there are two guests on board who have learned how to navigate the old way. So after our last land sighting, we started with measuring the Noon Latitude by shooting the meridian passage of the sun. We try to expand that by trying to shoot some stars as well and we will see if this week makes soms old fashioned navigators again.”