Mid Atlantic

At two o’clock this afternoon we have passed the halfway mark, with 1052 miles in our wake and with exactly the same distance ahead (as the crow flies). Life on board has settled into a timeless ocean routine, with us steadily working our way through Lady Ann’s on board library. Arriving at page 6504 of Patrick O’Brian’s masterpiece ‘the complete Aubrey/Maturin novels’ we are struck by the description of routine life in the heydays of British Naval History, in the early nineteenth century. Nothing has changed really! So let me paraphrase life on board in the words of the undisputed master of naval literature:

“Quietly indeed they sailed along, with gentle breezes that wafted them generally westwards at something in the nature of seven miles in the hour, westwards to even warmer seas. Little activity was called for, apart from the nice adjustment of the sails, and although the exact routine of the ship was never too relaxed nor her very strict rules of cleanliness, these long sunny days with a sailor’s wind seemed to many the ideal of a seaman’s life – regular, steady, traditional meals with the exact allowance of alcoholic spirits; loudspeaker music during nightly watches, the deep melody and reverberation of the Captain’s voice singing opera like (convinced the crew to be asleep), and the cheerful sound of the cook preparing dinner; the future lost in a haze somewhere west of the next meridian where the clock will have to be set back yet another hour.”