Four months ago I was lost in a small patch of forest on the outskirts of Opua, New Zealand. It was not my finest moment. I am a navigator, that’s my thing, a navigator first, a sailor second and somewhere after that, a writer of sorts. Even on land I pride myself on my ability to read nature’s signs and my sense of direction is like a finely honed blade. I am the guy who refuses to use GPS in the car and actually buys maps for road trips. I still use my sextant on passages, teach celestial navigation and plot position on paper charts. I don’t get lost.
But there I was, stumbling down an overgrown track from my airbnb and not exactly sure which way to go to find the boatyard where my sailboat QUETZAL was on the hard. I had deliberately turned off the main path, to explore a bit, and to find what I thought would be a shortcut. “Ok relax, get your bearings,” I told myself. I was a bit bewildered but thankful that I was alone so no one else would know I was - unsure - of where I was. It was cloudy, drizzly, and completely overgrown with no sun in sight. Pushing through deep weeds I knew, or at least thought I knew that I had to go north to find the road that rimmed the boatyard. The trees were bushy and mossy and the moss didn’t make sense. Then it hit me, moss grows on the south side of trees in the southern hemisphere! I had been walking the wrong way
.
Comments
Nothing yet. Say the first thing.
Sign in to join the conversation.