Magellan’s sail 500 years. And we will sail 500 more. Yes, it’s half a millennium since Ferdinand Magellan became the first man to sail around the world.
And set in motion the ultimate bucket list, the round-the-world cruise.
Which 450 years later my future Mrs M replicated, albeit another route, and through a now built Panama Canal.
As her family came home on a working ship from her father’s commission in Australia.
Ferdie’s bucket list
For Ferdi, in truth, he didn’t fulfil his bucket list.
He kicked the bucket in the Battle of Mactan in the modern-day Philippines so never did make it back to Seville.
And it was left to Juan Sebastian Elcano to complete the journey.
And isn’t it always the way, you complete the boss’s work and they still get all the credit.
Magellan, we obviously know from school geography and history.
Strait up
And he has his name carved into the map of the world in the Magellan Straits.
The strip at the foot of Chile between the Atlantic and the ocean he modestly named not for himself but the Pacific.
He took the name from the Spanish and Portuguese Mar Pacifico which means peaceful sea.
Now it may have taken 300 years for the first round the world cruise, Cunard’s RMS Laconia, we have been catching up since.
And there’s a swell range of cruises for next year to get away from it all.
Fair winds
So if you wanna stop the world because you want to get off then we’d like to put you onto the cruise specialists.
They’ll do the heavy lifting for you for the Cunards, Princess Cruises, MSC, Royal Caribbean Celebrity Cruises et al.
And that just leaves you to turn off the heating, put the key in the latch and take off.
Because wasn’t that just what Magellan would have done… and he didn’t have any fuel costs to worry about.
Because he worked on wind power, ah… Magellan’s sail 500 years.
