Sailors of Renown

“Found after 500 years: the wreck of Christopher Columbus' flagship...
Santa Maria...off the coast of Haiti...
one of the most significant discoveries in history. 

 He was the first person to cross the Atlantic and return.”

Reading this news item recently, caused me to consider other sailors who set out to discover new lands and opportunities. Is this not like LIFE...where we, too, set out on a journey of discovery? Perhaps we just want to go where we've never been before...a path of self-exploration.

Biblical Ships and Sailors

In ancient times, people had a great fear of the ocean and truly, there was reason for this dread since the mariners had no charts of the sea or compass to guide them. Travel by ship was usually inconvenient and windstorms often necessitated great delay in arrival at a destined port.

Jonah: This Phoenician ship in which he sailed was travelling from Joppa to Tarshish as a merchant ship when the storm came.

Paul: The ship in which he was to sail for Rome, got into difficulties because those in charge risked getting the ship to another harbor before winter set in.

The Egyptians: They easily plied the Mediterranean Sea. Light-weight vessels of bulrushes (papyrus) were piloted by both Egyptians and Ethiopians on the Nile River.

Explorers of the New World

Impossible to name the list of hundreds,

here are names (in alphabetical order) that are recognizable to me:

Edwin “Buzz” Aldrin...Neil Armstrong...John Cabot...Sebastian Cabot...Rene-Robert Cavelier (whom we know as La Salle)...Samuel de Champlain...James Cook... Francis Drake...Leif Ericson...Sir John Franklin...Simon Fraser...Vasco da Gama...Sir Edmund Hilary...Henry Hudson...Ferdinand Magellan...Henry the Navigator...Robert Peary...Zebulon Pike...Marco Polo...David Thompson...George Vancouver.

Some returned as heroes...others lost at sea even impacted in ice of the Arctic, Greenland or Antarctica.

Ship disasters in recent years have taken many lives: ships during wartime, the Titanic and other cruise ships gone off-course...ferry boats in storms...freighters in fog, wind and hurricanes.

Ensuing blog submissions re 'Explorer' Exploits:

In October 2014, I detailed writings about Sir John Franklin's HMS Terror and HMS Erebus. This was huge significant news!!! In July 2015, The Canadian Press published, Reporter Resigns from Toronto Star over Franklin Coverage. For your information, here are a few excerpts from the article.

Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Paul Wilson said Wednesday, he quit the country's largest newspaper so he could get the truth out about last year's successful search for Sir John Franklin's lost ships in the Canadian Arctic. The veteran reporter said fear leads to silence, which in turn breeds more fear.

“It's time. No more fear.

Stand up for the people being silenced and give them voice.

That's the only way we'll take our democracy back.”

Watson said at a meeting Tuesday in Vancouver with Star editors, he submitted his resignation over “the newspaper's refusal to publish a story of significant public interest.” Resigning, he said was the only way he could resume that reporting and fulfil his responsibilities as a journalist. “My reporting is an attempt to give voice to the federal civil servants and others involved in the gruelling, High Arctic search for British Royal Navy explorer, Sir John Franklin's lost ships,” He told the website 'Canadaland' that the Star ordered him to stop reporting the story.

The Canadian Press is jointly owned by Torstar

and the parent companies of the Globe and Mail and Montreal's La Presse.

Be sure to read “HMS TERROR and HMS EREBUS” ~ Part I

in my next posting (written May 21, 2014).

Philosophies re Sailing Through Life

You could never cross the ocean unless you have the courage to lose sight of the shore. (Unknown)

Life's roughest storms prove the strength of our anchors. (Unknown)

The man who has experienced shipwreck, shudders even at a calm sea. (Ovid, poet)

The pessimist complains about the winds; the optimist expects it to change; the realist adjusts the sails. (William Arthur Wald ~ writer).

The Maptia Maniesto: I want to see the world...follow a map to its edges and keep going. Forego the plans and trust my instincts. Let curiosity be my Guide. I want to change hemispheres and sleep with unfamiliar stars. And let the journey unfold before me.

We must free ourselves of the hope that the sea will ever rest.

We must learn to sail in high winds.

(Aristotle Onassis ~ shipping magnate)

Dream higher than the sky and deeper than the ocean ~

and may your joys be as deep as the sea.

Merle Baird-Kerr...written May 21, 2014

Comments appreciated...e-mail to:

inezkate@gmail or mbairdkerr@cogeco.ca