How We Found the Children of Captain Grant—and Captain Grant Himself

How We Found the Children of Captain Grant—and Captain Grant Himself. The Last Phantom Reef of the 37th Parallel South We embarked on our expedition to the phantom islands of the Pacific almost by chance, while on our way to Samoa, where we had to put in an appearance in order to obtain a New Zealand visa. A light wind was setting us south instead of north-west, and everything pointed to us not making it to New Zealand before cyclone season. Sheltering among equatorial atolls for the whole summer sounds romantic when you’re in central Russia. In reality, it means heat from five in the morning, rain, humidity, an inability to pull yourself together, irritation and... boredom. Diary entry, 22 November: How the sailor decided to spend two months living on the ocean. ...The following morning, the wind continues to set us south of the course plotted for Samoa. While Nastya is still asleep, Andrei and I carry on with our wild speculations: What are we doing right now that’s remarkable? After Easter Island and Pitcairn —nothing. But we could head down along the 37th parallel now, and then on to Cape Horn... Andryukh, what’s our longitude? 153 degrees west, replied the captain. Hang on, I’ll fetch the sailing directions. And I bring over The Children of Captain Grant from Nastya’s shelf. Andryukha, Maria Theresa Reef is right here at 153 degrees longitude. 1,200 miles due south! Let’s turn, eh? We’ll go looking for Captain Grant. Andrei gets out the paper Admiralty chart: Listen, according to this it’s roughly at 137 degrees longitude. And the electronic chart says the same. And just like that, we had the first objective of a research expedition with the working title “Out of Our Minds”: Andryukh, let’s head down to the 37th parallel along the 153rd meridian, then follow it to the 136th and see for ourselves whether the reef exists or not (we no longer mention an island: on every known chart, Maria Theresa has always been marked as a reef). We discuss how we’ll carry on to Cape Horn afterwards, and when we’ll be back... Not seriously—we’re just laughing: “Let’s do it!.. Just imagine!..” Cracking up. Joking, sort of. Meanwhile, somehow or other, our course has already turned south all by itself... We have finished editing episode ten of the series about the expedition to the phantom islands of the Pacific. After that, Lady Mary set a course for Cape Horn via the oceanic Pole of Inaccessibility . More about that in the next video. Lady Mary has been sailing along the 37th parallel in search of Captain Grant since episode eight of the film about the Expedition to the Phantom Islands of the Pacific. Only the last island remains—Maria Theresa Reef, as shown on the 2014 British Admiralty chart. Come along and see it with your own eyes!