Reliance on modern technology

[kpgraci]

I found this interesting when compared to our modern reliance on gps.

In "Sailing alone around the world", Joshua Slocom writes:

"The want of a chronometer for the voyage was all that now worried me. In our newfangled notions of navigation it is supposed that a mariner cannot find his way without one; I had myself drifted into this way of thinking."

He wrote this in 1901 about his 1895 voyage.

 

[Justin_NSA]

A good movie about early sailing is "Longitude". In the 18th century there was no way to navigate the ocean accurately because sailors couldn't calculate longitude. The movie captures the attempt to do so. Some of the personal drama gets old, but the history is interesting.