Walter Bushell wrote
chazworth wrote
Walter Bushell wrote
Rod Speed wrote
Walter Bushell wrote
Rod Speed wrote
wrote
Giga "Giga" wrote
wrote
Sean O'Hara wrote
wrote
Giga "Giga" wrote
Greg Goss wrote

They laughed at Columbus because they knew that the water tanks
and food supplies on his ship could never let him reach Japan.

And you know what? The intellectuals were right about that.

But ships very often stopped somewhere, like a small island, to resupply such things.

And what islands might that be?

If we assume as a point of departure that the Americas are
submerged, say one kilometer, there'd be a huge archipelago
consisting of the Andes, Rockies, Sierra Nevadas, etc, and a
smaller one for the Appalachians. Columbus still could've landed
on Hispanola, though it would've been a small island chain.

In that scenario, you are less than half way to Japan.

Absent a good map, the odds of stumbling upon one
of the few islands on the way to Japan is near zero.

No

Seems the map makers disagree and have the vast
majority of islands in the Pacific south of Japan.

The vast majority is completely irrelevant, even those without any nav
aids or maps managed to find those as isolated as Easter Island etc.

And non volcanic. If a major eruption is going on an island can be detected from far away.

They didnt need anything like that to find Easter Island.

It is common of people to go off on cruises to nowhere
after they have lost a war and lack resources.

FAR more often they go to places like Easter Island for other reasons.

Sometimes they find new land. How else was Hawaii settled?

It certainly wasnt by randomly cruising around until they found something.

Easter Island in spades.

True, and those people were adept at finding clues.
But they did not find Pitcairn island, AFAIK.

Actually you don't know that. WHy would they have settled there when
there were so many other more amenable islands all over polynesia?
Pitcairn is a hell hole.

Unable to sustain itself even today with modern technology,
produces no exports and needs to import, no good harbor,

Those clearly werent what mattered when it was colonised by the polynesians.

and can't sustain a viable population.

Clearly it could for hundreds of years.

Aside from that it's paradise.