Sailing Alone Around the World: Illustrated - Softcover

Slocum, Joshua

Softcover

ISBN 10: 154266103X ISBN 13: 9781542661034

Publisher: CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform, 2017

Synopsis

Sailing Alone Around the World (1900) is a sailing memoir by Joshua Slocum about his single-handed global circumnavigation aboard the sloop Spray. Slocum was the first person to sail around the world alone. The book was an immediate success and highly influential in inspiring later travelers.Joshua Slocum (1844–1909) was the first man to sail single-handedly around the world. Seaman and adventurer, wrote a book about his journey Sailing Alone Around the World. He disappeared in November 1909 while aboard his boat, the Spray.There was considerable international interest in Slocum's journey, particularly once he had entered the Pacific; he was awaited at most of his ports of call, and gave lectures and lantern-slide shows to well-filled halls.The trip itinerary went as follows: Fairhaven, Boston, Gloucester, Nova Scotia, Azores, Gibraltar, (Morocco), Canary Islands, Cape Verde Islands, Pernambuco, Rio de Janeiro, Maldonado, Montevideo, Strait of Magellan, Cockburn Channel, Port Angosto, Juan Fernandez, Marquesas, Samoa, Fiji, Sydney, Melbourne, Tasmania, Cooktown, Christmas Island, Keeling Cocos, Rodrigues, Mauritius, Durban, Cape Town, (Transvaal), St Helena, Ascension Island, Devil's Island, Trinidad, Grenada, Newport, Fairhaven.

About this title

Review

"Surely one of the all-time classic sailing narratives, this is more than just an account of a fascinating and often arduous journey, it has also given rise to a mythology all its own." -- Classic Boat "Classic Boat"

"Captain Slocum's place in history is as secure as Adams's. So long as men sailed the seas they will be interested in that first single-handed circumnavigation and will wish to read the book....There is not one single moment at which the ancient mariner is in danger of losing the attention of his audience. And this is true not only of the first, but, as I well know, of the twentieth or maybe thirtieth time of reading."--Arthur Ransome

Captain Slocum's place in history is as secure as Adams's. So long as men sailed the seas they will be interested in that first single-handed circumnavigation and will wish to read the book....There is not one single moment at which the ancient mariner is in danger of losing the attention of his audience. And this is true not only of the first, but, as I well know, of the twentieth or maybe thirtieth time of reading.--Arthur Ransome

About the Author

Joshua Slocum (1844–1909) was the first man to sail single-handedly around the world. He was a Canadian born, naturalised American seaman and adventurer, and a noted writer. In 1900 he told the story of this in Sailing Alone Around the World. He disappeared in November 1909 while aboard his boat, the Spray. In Fairhaven, Massachusetts, he rebuilt the gaff rigged sloop oyster boat named Spray. On April 24, 1895, he set sail from Boston, Massachusetts. After an extended visit to his boyhood home at Brier Island and visiting old haunts on the coast of Nova Scotia, Slocum took his departure from North America at Sambro Island Lighthouse near Halifax, Nova Scotia on July 3, 1895. Slocum navigated without a chronometer, instead relying on the traditional method of dead reckoning for longitude, which required only a cheap tin clock for approximate time, and noon-sun sights for latitude. On one long passage in the Pacific, Slocum also famously shot a lunar distance observation, decades after these observations had ceased to be commonly employed, which allowed him to check his longitude independently. However, Slocum's primary method for finding longitude was still dead reckoning; he made only one lunar observation during the entire circumnavigation. Slocum normally sailed the Spray without touching the helm. Due to the length of the sail plan relative to the hull, and the long keel, the Spray was capable of self-steering (unlike faster modern craft), and balanced stably on any course relative to the wind by adjusting or reefing the sails and by lashing the helm fast. He sailed 2,000 miles (3,200 km) west across the Pacific without once touching the helm. More than three years later, on June 27, 1898, he returned to Newport, Rhode Island, having circumnavigated the world, a distance of more than 46,000 miles (74,000 km). Slocum's return went almost unnoticed. The Spanish-American War which had begun two months earlier dominated the headlines. After the end of major hostilities, many American newspapers published articles describing Slocum's amazing adventure. In 1899 he published his account of the epic voyage in Sailing Alone Around the World, first serialized in The Century Magazine and then in several book-length editions.

Edition details

• Publisher: CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform
• Publication date: 2017
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 154266103X
• ISBN 13: 9781542661034
• Binding: Paperback
• Illustrator: Fogarty Thomas, Varian George
• Number of pages: 160