maritime

  My brother is an entertaining writer of short stories, Here  is one on our childhood memories . Memories Memory is a funny thing.  As my mother entered her final years, she seemed to have an incredible recall of events and people from over 80 years in the past.  Whilst still aware enough to remember who the prime minister was, she would have trouble remembering what had happened to her in the last week.   My memory for some things is poor; I am dreadful at remembering names.  I can recall that I know the face, but often not the association or the name.  On the other hand, my wife’s memory for names and faces is amazing.  She still on occasions meets and remembers people who she knew at primary school.   I can remember numbers, places, names of places and events.  It probably says a lot about the kind of people we are.  My wife is a warm, friendly people person.  I can remember numbers.   But the purpose of this piece is ...

  I used copilot to draft this article and then edited it. My experience was that it limited my creativity and it took just aas long to edit the artificial intelligence derived draft as to start with a blank page. A Personal Account of a Memorable Getaway Introduction There’s nothing quite like escaping the arrival of winter with cold and long nights with a well-earned holiday. Recently, I had the pleasure of spending a week in Ischia in Italy, and I’m delighted to share my experience. Whether you’re seeking adventure, relaxation, or a bit of both, Ischia offers an abundance of delights that make it a great destination. Accommodation We stayed in a small hotel in the main town on the island, a quiet oasis set back from the main road into town. Reminded me of other southern Italian towns with open arches instead of doors all painted white. Activities and Attractions Boat tour: To explore the southern coat of this volcanic island revealed stunning bays with small village and also lar...

 Background The Navigator possesses 2 personal traits that greatly enhance his ability to navigate. His eyes and his ears. Both require he or she have the highest medical standards for sight and hearing. Colour blindness is not an option if you are to be a deck officer as you must be able to distinguish between the major navigational colours of red, green and white. The navigator is trained to identify conditions in his maritime environment. The sky, the horizon, sea surface and objects around him, all need to be analysed and translated into navigational decisions. He must be able to differentiate them by day or by night. By day During the day he normally has a focus on weather. [1] To start interpreting weather for navigation purposes, the navigator first turns to the barometer. The marine barometer [2] is quite special, not at all like the circular aneroid barometers seen on land. Instead it is a glass column filled with mercury. The scale on the side facilitates the r...

  Summer Holidays are always welcome and especially when we go to Denmark. The holiday really starts when you leave home and that requires planning because we are going to take a ferry from Norway to Denmark in the middle of summer, lots of people on the road. Lots of traffic. Nevertheless, it is exciting as we pack all our goods and prepare to set off. The first challenge is. Shall we stop and have a cup of coffee on the way or are do we not have time? Must we press on because of delays on the road etc with good planning, that's not a problem, so we stop and have a cup of coffee. Very pleasant. Then we set off for the ferry terminal and the queue starts about 3 kilometres from the ferry terminal and we join a queue. Everything gets exciting. We pay for our entry. They know all about us. Because they have the car registration number from the overhead camera and we booked online no problem. Straight into a parking lane with a ticket to let us into the buffet when we get on boa...

  On a package charter flight You would think that as you get older it would be easy to travel abroad, especially if you spent a large part of your career travelling internationally. But it does not. Why is that? Well, your age and your physical and mental resources become somewhat diminished. Secondly, travel procedures change. Remember how parking rules change and become confusing. Well, it's the same with flying, especially if you are on a package tour. It starts the day before travel when you start the challenge of finding your travel gear. Where are my sunglasses? Do I need my swimming gear in the Canary Islands in February etc etc.? You learn as your memory fails you to assemble everything in one place before packing and only then start the procedure of packing. What are the travel agent’s rules for the tour. Well, they're different from ordinary flight booking and check in procedures. No check-in details, only a booking reference number. But it is all sorted ...

  [1] Background The compass, sextant, chronometer, and radar are tools that fix the ships position on a chart, meaning the position is a known place “on the ground”. The speed of a ship is another parameter important to navigation and historically has been achieved by measuring the passage of an object alongside the ship. The principle is that an object thrown overboard stays stationery as the ship moves past it. If we can measure the time it takes for the ship to pass the object, we can measure the speed of the ship. There is an important provision here. It measures distance travelled through the water not “over the ground”. Therefore the effects of water mass movement, tide and wind on the ship are not taken account of. The structure of the log is simple. A quadrant-shaped piece of wood is weighted with lead to hold the quadrant vertical in the water. A bridle is attached to each corner of the quadrant and then to a log line that is wound on a spool. A release line is ...