Never a chore, and never, ever, boring

Forty years ago, I was in the naval section of my school cadet force, where we spent hours learning to put one foot in front of the other, and how to raise and lower the sails on a battered old whaler. But I also learned to navigate – to use a compass, to stream and recover a Walker log, and to read a tide table.

Ten years later, I was still using a compass and a Walker log as I ferried paying punters around the English Channel on jolly yottie holidays. We all knew about Decca , and radar, but they were for bigger boats or for private owners with plenty of cash. The only electronics we had were Seafarer “spinning neon” echo sounders (which worked) and RDF sets (which didn’t).

 

Finding the right bit of France was always challenge, but most of us got it right, most of the time. Occasionally we didn’t – but there was never any real harm done. But it was often fun. It was sometimes exciting. And it always gave us plenty to talk about in the pub that weekend, and to reminisce about thirty years later.  Navigating was never a chore, and never, ever, boring.

Don’t get me wrong: I love the latest goodies. Even now, I am amazed that a thing the size of a fag packet can receive radio signals from transmitters that are no more powerful than domestic light bulbs, thousands of miles out in space, and work out where I am to within a matter of a few feet.  I am gobsmacked by the fact that a collection of charts that would have filled a marina trolley several times over in 1970 can now be fitted into a sliver of plastic the size of a postage stamp.

But I do sometimes wonder whether our expectation that things must go on getting simpler or safer means that in thirty years time we might not be able to look back to 2010 and say “Navigating was never a chore, and never, ever, boring.”

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