The Naming Convention of Winds
Winds are labelled with the direction they have come from, not the direction they head towards, but why? A Westerly wind has come from the…
Winds are labelled with the direction they have come from, not the direction they head towards, but why? A Westerly wind has come from the…
“It was our first and only experience in 50 years of cruising of navigating by gannet!” My thanks to Christopher for this lovely email and…
What does “constant bearing, constant danger” mean? And why does it sometimes lead to a very dangerous problem? This expression is a neat abbreviation of…
Here is a lovely nod to sailors navigating by sea swells off the Shetland Isles – it is rare to find reference to this swell…
Early this morning I saw an interesting sign in the water, a clue that fish were trying to defy a predator. At about 6am, I…
Heavier gases sink, lighter gases rise. That is how a hot air balloon works: the warm air expands making it lighter than the surrounding air…
… the Earth’s refreshed by frequent showers. It is so rewarding when weather lore helps us remember a clue. It is doubly satisfying when this…
It’s a full moon today. Full moons mean unusually big, fast and powerful tides over the next few days. You might also enjoy: How to…
Most navigators, even inexperienced ones, learn that colours are important when trying to identify navigation marks at sea. And most people also know that there…
When John Pahl and I were sailing around Iceland, we noticed that you could use the puffins to indicate the direction of land very reliably,…
How to Read Signs in Every Cloud, Breeze, Hill, Street, Plant, Animal, and Dewdrop The weather changes as we walk around a tree or turn…
Have a good look at the picture above. I took it during a night walk along the Brighton seafront. If I was planning to set…
My favourite signs always combine simplicity, elegance and practicality. They are often so effective that technology can’t improve on them. Cats’ Paws, the ruffled patterns…
Something a little different today – a guest blog. I am very grateful to Hye Jung Kim and all the team at Project Wayfinder for…
Slick lines form on water when a very thin layer of oil spreads out across the water. The oil dampens ripples creating calmer patches. Over…
Whenever the tide turns, water heads from one area to another. This sets up a flow known as tidal currents. Tidal currents moving over a…
A morning glance at a moody and cloudy twilight led me to laying down some of my thoughts about the key challenges facing celestial navigation…
The definition of the word ‘fetch’ is simple: The distance that wind travels over open water. But why do we need to know that? Spend…
When a gust of wind touches the surface of calm water, it creates a localised patch of bigger ripples. These can be seen as a…
My thanks to Pertti Pesonen for reminding me of these passages in Joshua Slocum’s classic, ‘Sailing Alone Around the World’: On the 12th, some hundred…
For thousands of years, sailors have used the colour of the sea to help them make sense of the waters they travelled through. In many…