The Procrastination of an Outdoors Writer
Today marks the start of the writing of a new book. And what better way to celebrate it, than by procrastinating! As writers go, I…
Tag: sea
Wall Street Journal Book Review
The Wall Street Journal has recently reviewed The Natural Navigator book. Here is a taster: “…as the title of his deeply poetic book—”The Natural Navigator”—suggests,…
Back from the Arctic
Yesterday I arrived back home after sailing north from Scotland via the Faroe Islands into the Arctic, finishing at Reykjavik. I used the trip to…
A Unique Sense of Place
Navigation is about knowing where you are as much as working out how to get to where you want to be. A lot of the…
Nature and Technology
Following on from my last blog post about the windvane self-steering marvel, comes another wonderful piece of sailing technology. Although this one also works closely…
Windvane Self-Steering
Although microchips have a childlike tendency to steal our attention away from almost anything else, I am not against technology itself. Once we have steeled…
Classic Cold Front
A cold front is the leading edge of a mass of cold air as it displaces a warmer mass of air at ground level. Cold…
The Cloud Compass
Happy Winter Solstice One and All! Here’s an interesting solstice fact for you: the Earth is actually receiving more solar radiation at this time of…
NBC’s Today Show
If you have navigated your way here from NBC’s Today, welcome to the wonderful and unusual world of natural navigation. Have an explore and get…
All Roads Lead Home Update
A huge thank you to everyone for all the messages that have been coming in about All Roads Lead Home. I thought it was time…
Orange Lichens
This photo, from my recent and gallette-packed French summer holiday, shows the distinctive orange lichens that have daubed a southern-facing wall of Suscinio Castle in…
Ocean Swell Navigation
Last night I accidentally stumbled on one of the best images of ocean swell that I have come across. I was looking at Essaouira on…
Sculptures in the Sand
Each part of the world has its unique natural navigational heritage with distinct differences, making each appear totally foreign to the other on first meeting.…
Moussa Koussa
Initial excitement in the UK about the apparent defection of Gaddafi’s right-hand man, Moussa Koussa, has been dampened now that the real reason for his…
The Voyage of the Beagle
One of the first things that Charles Darwin discovered, during his epic travels on board the Beagle, was a dramatic natural navigation clue. Darwin was…
Words by the Water Festival
I have just returned from a wonderful couple of days in the Lake District. I was at the ‘Words by the Water’ literary festival in…
Humboldt and Flying Fish
I’m doing some research at the moment and came across this line, written by the German explorer Alexander von Humboldt, about flying fish: ‘Like swallows…
Venus in Cirrus
Venus and the brighter stars, like Arcturus, appeared shrouded in a veil this morning. This was not mist close to the ground – horizontal visibility…
Mares’ Tails
A weekend of sailing has just passed, one that was full of meteorological kindness. Nature was generous in two ways over the weekend – perhaps…
RNLI Navigation
My thanks to the RNLI, who gave me the opportunity of going to sea with them this afternoon. They were also kind enough to let…