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The sea is not featureless by a long shot. The color, temperature, ratio of
wavelength to wave height and type of things floating by are all some
indications of where you are. The shape of waves will also vary depending on
where you are and the difference between the wind direction and wave
direction tells you a lot about what land is to windward.
All the best,
Robert Gainer


>From: Fred Hebard 
>Reply-To: Navigation Mailing List 
>To: NAVIGATION-L@LISTSERV.WEBKAHUNA.COM
>Subject: Re: No sextant, no watch, no almanach, nothing
>Date: Sun, 7 Nov 2004 20:51:35 -0500
>
>On Nov 7, 2004, at 7:42 PM, Alexandre Eremenko wrote:
>
>>On Sat, 6 Nov 2004, Dr. Geoffrey Kolbe wrote:
>>>Voyagers like the Polynesians,
>>>for example, who roamed the Pacific seas with
>>>"no sextant, no watch, no
>>>almanac, nothing",
>>
>>I suppose they also did not have compass, so DR
>>was not available to them, and they had to rely
>>on CelNav entirely. So I would be interested to know
>>more details on how exactly they did it.
>>
>>It is easy to imagine for me how they determine latitude.
>>What is really hard to imagine, that they could determine
>>longitude by their Cel Nav methods, even roughly.
>>
>
>There are a few threads in the archives on Polynesian navigation, with
>some links to nice sites about that.  There was a famous voyager who
>passed away about 1 year ago, who first coaxed Micronesians into
>telling how they navigated.  Perhaps somebody else will fill in more
>details.
>
>Regarding longitude, the Micronesians were very aware of various
>features of the sea at different locations, such as the Sargassos Sea
>(yes, I realize that is in the Atlantic, I am using it as an example of
>a feature in a supposedly featureless place).
>
>Fred

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