Day 138
The wind has reached storm intensity, but remains favourable tailwind. It is a little too Northerly, but that’s ok, I need to go South.
I have reached the latitude of the western entrance to the Strait of Magellan. It is just 450 kilometres as the crow flies to the Strait. I haven’t been this close to dry land throughout this entire journey, not counting its first week. Yesterday a ship passed me. It passed me at my starboard side, heading for the Drake Passage. First, my Active Echo beeped, informing me that a vessel was within 8 miles of me (the boat’s low position in the water means that the radar’s operational range is 8 miles). I made contact with the boat, and the watch officer asked: “Are you AKROS?” It is good that they saw me too. It is reassuring.
People keep asking: Why do we need journeys of exploration in the 21st Century? Who needs this? By this logic we might ask other questions like: Why do we still write poetry in the 21st Century? Throughout human history millions of poems have been written, but every day new poems appear. It is how people express their feelings about the world, about God, about their loved ones, about all that excites people.
Why paint pictures? There are thousands of pictures! The galleries of the world are hung with masterpieces, but artists in every country continue to paint, to show how they see the world and express their relationship with it. Ivan Shishkin masterfully painted forests and nature. Should we now lay down our brushes? Ivan Aivazovskiy created masterpieces of maritime landscapes. Should we shy away from painting the oceans and seas? Nicholas Roerich painted the mountains, but it does not mean that we should fold our arms. Yes, Roerich worked strikingly, but he lived in his own time, and we look at the world with different eyes.
Pictured: Painting by F. Konyukhov, oil, 2012
It is the same with exploration. Even if we map every corner of our planet, we will never be able to completely map ourselves. Humankind will always strive to learn and express its feelings though art, science, travel, inquiry, and music.
God created the Himalayas, the deserts, lakes, and rivers. Some take road trips, traversing the countryside with their family, some ski to the South Pole, some raft along the rivers – these are all ways of learning. There are more and less extreme ways of exploring. Everything depends on what a person is prepared to do, but travel has, does, and will always exist.
Fedor Konyukhov
Southern Ocean
52’45 South, 81’30 West