What exactly is circumnavigation? (excerpt from the site www.solocircumnavigation.com)
Since Magellan and his crew proved in 1522 that one could sail continuously in one direction until once again reaching one’s homeport, circumnavigating the globe has been aspiration of countless sailors. Probably the first yacht to circumnavigate was British schooner Nancy Dawson finishing in 1850. Joshua Slocum did the first solo circumnavigation over one hundred years ago. Then others followed their example of leisure cruising from one port or anchorage to the next, until 1967-68 when Sir Francis Chichester sailed from Plymouth to Sydney and back via Cape Horn for speed.
He set the time mark for those who followed. Now the challenge became not simply to sail around the world, but to be the fastest to do so. More sailors, either solo or with crew, set out for circumnavigation and started to claim they were fastest. And here the trouble started.
As we know the speed is calculated as time over distance. During circumnavigation the time is done by our calendar system but the distance could be very different. Basically, to circle the globe means that you cross all 360 meridians of longitude. If everybody would be able to do it on the equator, everything would be OK because everybody would have to cover the same distance for the speed claim. The problem is that you can cross all 360 meridians close to the North or South Pole and you may claim that you have done circumnavigation as well.
If you do it a few feet off the pole, you can be very fast too, but would it be fair to claim it as a circumnavigation?
So how to set fair rules for specification of circumnavigation, especially when everybody can start the voyage in a different corner of the world? The answer is very simple: you must at least follow a great circle. But what is a great circle?
A great circle is a line traced on the surface of the globe by a plane cutting through the sphere at its center. It is a largest circle, which can be drawn on the surface of globe.
All longitudes are great circles because the plane cutting through every meridian of longitude cuts through the center of globe as well as through North and South Pole. Unfortunately there is no way to sail just following meridians.
If you put plane through the latitudes, only plane going through equator crosses the center of the globe and therefore only equator is a great circle. But again, you cannot sail following the equator, because the continents.
The simplest way to prove that one followed the great circle is to put the plane through any point of one’s sailing, preferably through the start point, and through the center of the globe, and then to find the opposite point on that plane – the point called antipode. Simply put, if somebody’s journey crosses pair of antipodes, he sailed a great circle (most probably even more due to passing around the continents), and he can claim true circumnavigation.
If a trip did not cross a pair of antipodes, the sailing did not follow the great circle. It does not matter how much shorter voyage was, even if the passage was longer that the one done just around the pole, the claim has no merit and is doubtful.
On his journey, Donde will have three stop-overs in Australia, New Zealand and South Africa. Asked how he would spend his time as he singly traverses the world’s oceans, Donde said if the weather conditions permitted, he would catch up on a novel. 'When I need to sleep, the yacht will be on auto-pilot,' he said. His friend Kabir has advised him to take a talking parrot with him, in case he feels like talking to someone
Incidentally, one person to solo circumnavigate the globe, Sir Robin Knox Johnston of the UK, in 1968-69 in 312 days, and who is Donde's mentor is in Goa to help tune the boat and train Donde for the mission.
The boat costs around Rs 4 crores, while the journey will come to another Rs 2 crores.
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