How to get to a desert island. My attempt to move to a desert island
Where there are white people everywhere sandy beaches, azure water and palm trees. However, sometimes there are situations when in such a tropical resort there is only one goal - to survive. There may be many situations why this happened, but the result is one. Therefore, there are several rules that will help you best get out of the situation.
Do not panic
The first step is to assess the situation by looking around.
Quite often in such cases, people can have amnesia. Therefore, you should calm down, think and remember what happened, what events preceded this. It is also important what time of day you were there. If it's daytime and the sun is directly above you, worth a look desert island and find a shadow. In addition, you should not behave too actively: screaming, running, because in this way you can attract the attention of animals, among which there may be predators.
Try to locate
See if there is a body of water nearby. Sometimes people get to a desert island from the air. Therefore, your fall can happen right into the forest. In this case, you should try to find a reservoir. It can be a river, an ocean, a sea.
If this is a river, following along the coast, you may come across local residents and ask them for help. In the event that you can’t navigate, it’s worth starting the construction of an overnight stay. Remember, in such places, darkness creeps up unexpectedly, it can be fraught with many dangers.
Building a place to sleep
This does not require any special skills. It will be enough to build a hut. Temporary housing should protect from scorching and tropical heavy rains at night. Do not forget about firewood. If possible, you should stock up on as many of them as possible, however, it is desirable that they be dry. If you don’t have lighters and matches, then you will have to turn to the experience of your ancestors and make fire with a piece of dry bark and a small twig. They must be rubbed against each other until a spark appears, which later turns into a flame. However, it is worth remembering that this can take more than one hour, so you should be prepared for this and show perseverance. Fire will help drive away animals, cook food, and keep you warm.
Search for food
Sooner or later, any person who finds himself on a desert island will want to drink and eat. Therefore, it is advisable to find food in advance. Here they can become berries and plants. You may also see familiar fruits such as coconuts and bananas. However, if you come across a fruit that is not known to you, then it is better not to eat it. Remember, it can be poisonous. It may also happen that you have to eat insects, of course, they do not look very edible, but they can be very nutritious.
Fresh water
It is necessary to look around and look for the source. If it is found, you can consider yourself lucky. However, it is worth remembering that many unknown microorganisms may not allow survival at any cost. In this case, an uninhabited island can bring such unpleasant surprises as poisoning or dysbacteriosis. Therefore, water must be boiled. If there is no reservoir, then dew and rain will have to be collected. To do this, use large leaves. Of course, this method will not allow you to quench your thirst, but it will not let you die either.
Signal means
Probably everyone has seen pictures in which a person ended up on a desert island. Photos usually reflect that torches are used as signaling means. It is not difficult to build them, using dry leaves and dumping them in a mountain. You can put a word out of them. If you see or hear a vehicle, you should immediately give signals.
The desert island is a beautiful romantic place that is located in the middle of blue, deep, ocean waters. Oh, how much temptation, mystery and hidden danger are contained in these two words. And what beauty, unknown to the human eye, is in the green jungle, filled with the sounds of the wild forest and the singing of exotic birds. Probably, every inhabitant of a huge metropolis dreams of being there and staying in this boundless silence for a while, having a rest from the loud city sounds and enjoying the gifts of this paradise to the fullest. But one question arises, how to get to a desert island, while excluding the possibility of a shipwreck and a plane crash. You can get to a desert island in a safer and more reliable way. First, you need to decide on the direction where you would like to go. In fact, there are not so many uninhabited islands in the south of our planet, thanks to the development of the tourism business. However, you can find a secluded island by first studying it on the map, learning about the residential areas adjacent to it and deciding how to get to your destination from these points. ;
Basically, near the islands there are many settlements, residents who will be happy to tell you how to get to the island and provide transport for this, by which you can fly or swim. In the Pacific space of our planet, there are more than twenty-five thousand islands and small islets. Many of them were formed from underwater volcanic rocks, coral reefs, and also arose as a result of earthquakes. Alone standing islands, absolutely deserted, but this does not mean that they are uninhabited, there is a real, living world of mollusks, fish and various mammals in coral reefs and stones. This is the dream of every person who wants to know how to get to an island with such a heavenly description and a complete embodiment of peace and tranquility. Today, in connection with the development of the tourism business, going to any of these islands will not be difficult. The travel agency will help develop the desired route, purchase tickets and make a list of things necessary for living on the island.
In order to visit the island, you do not always need to travel outside your homeland. Here, for example, in the urban environs of St. Petersburg for many years there has been a real island called Yelagin. And on the island of Tom, built a stone palace of unprecedented beauty with pavilions, greenhouses and pavilions. The grandeur and grace of the Elagin Palace enchant every visitor and do not leave indifferent to its beauty and magnificence. St. Petersburg's guests are irresistibly attracted by Elagin Island, how to get to it by metro is this question tormenting them? It is best to get to the glorious island from the Krestovy Ostrov station, and then walk along Ryukhina Street to the Elaginsky Bridge. And in the summer, this place can be reached by aquabus - a fixed-route water taxi that departs from the very center of St. Petersburg opposite the Finland Station. This way of travel is quite economical and allows you to fully enjoy the beauties of St. Petersburg and the Neva River.
The novel "Robinson Crusoe" immortalized the name of Daniel Defoe, and the name of the protagonist has long become a household name. Any child in childhood imagined how he would end up on a desert island and survive here. What can I say, not only a boy. So, just recently we talked about a ruined millionaire who celebrated the 20th anniversary of his stay on the island. But what other real stories of Robinsons are there?
Robinson Crusoe Island, where Alexander Selkirk spent 4 years
Lived on a desert island: 4 years and 4 months
The story of the Scottish sailor Alexander Selkirk just inspired Defoe to write the novel, it was he who became the prototype of Robinson Crusoe. True, the literary hero spent 28 years on the island, and during this long time alone with nature and with himself, he grew spiritually. Selkirk stayed on the island for 4 years, and he got there not as a result of a shipwreck, but after a quarrel with the captain. And no Friday friend for you, and, of course, cannibals. However, Alexander managed to survive in harsh conditions, he ate shellfish, tamed feral goats and built two huts. In 1709, the sailor was discovered by English ships. When Selkirk returned to London, he told his amazing story writer Richard Steele, who published it in a newspaper.
By the way, the island on which Selkirk lived alone was later called Robinson Crusoe. And 150 kilometers from it there is another island - Alexander-Selkirk.
Traveler Daniel Foss
Lived on a desert island: 5 years
The story of another traveler, Daniel Foss, is also surprising. A man at the end of the 18th century traveled on the ship "Negociant" with a crew through the northern seas, where they hunted seals. The ship collided with an iceberg, and 21 people managed to escape by boat. For a month and a half they sailed on the waves until two people were left alive. Soon the boat was thrown ashore, where Foss lost his last comrade. And this island turned out to be far from paradise: a small rocky piece of land, where there was nothing but a rookery for seals. Actually, seal meat helped Daniel survive, and he drank rainwater. Only five years later, in 1809, Foss was picked up by a passing ship. At the same time, the poor fellow had to swim before him, as the captain was afraid that he would run the ship aground.
Tom Neal - voluntary hermit
Lived on a desert island: approximately 16 years
But there are stories about voluntary seclusion. Yes, almost 16 years. coral island Suvorov became the home of Tom Neil, a native of New Zealand. He first visited the island in 1952. The man domesticated chickens, started a garden, caught crabs, shellfish and fish. Thus, the New Zealander lived on the island for almost three years, and after a serious injury he was taken out. But this did not stop him from returning: Tom returned to his paradise in 1960 for three and a half years, and then in 1966 for ten years. After his second stay, Neil wrote the book An Island for Myself, which became a bestseller.
Jeremy Beebs - Robinson, who managed to grow old on the island
Lived on a desert island: 74 years
In 1911, the ship "Beautiful Bliss" was shipwrecked. Only Jeremy Beebs survived. Then he was only 14 years old. Due to his age, he was very fond of adventure novels, and what do you think was one of his favorite books? Of course, Robinson Crusoe. Here he learned basic survival skills, learned how to keep a calendar, hunt and build huts. The young man managed to grow old on the island: they took him only in 1985 as an 88-year-old man. Just imagine, during this time two world wars have passed and man has mastered space.
Alexey Khimkov with friends - polar Robinsons
Lived on a desert island: 6 years
This story is even more severe: without tropical forests and warm sea. The team lived in the Arctic ice for six years. In 1743, headed by helmsman Alexei Khimkov, a merchant ship went fishing and got stuck in the ice. A team of four went to the coast of the Svalbard archipelago, where they found a hut. Here they planned to spend the night, but fate decreed otherwise: a strong Arctic wind carried the ice floes along with the ship into the open sea, where the ship sank. The hunters had only one way out - to insulate the hut and wait for rescue. As a result, they lived on the island for 6 years, during which time the team made homemade spears and bows. They hunted bears and deer and also fished. So the harsh Arctic winter turned out to be tough for men. However, there was an outbreak of scurvy in their small camp, and one of the travelers died.
Six years later, a ship sailed past the island, which saved the polar Robinsons. But they did not board empty-handed: during this long time they managed to get about 200 skins of a large animal and about the same amount of arctic fox. About the misadventures of the Russian Robinsons, the book “The Adventures of Four Russian Sailors Brought to the Island of Spitsbergen by a Storm” was later published, which was translated into several languages.
Vacation on a desert island? Is that possible? Nowadays, everywhere is full of tourists, and the opportunity to relax on a tropical island with a personal chef and your own piece of white sand beach is available only to very wealthy people. However, there are still hidden corners in the world where there will be no one on the island but you, the length of your own white beach is measured in kilometers, and a bungalow with a personal chef and all amenities costs less per day than a cup of coffee in a Moscow cafe.
I wrote more about how to get to this island in previous posts (you can find their table of contents at the end of the post). I can only say that getting to Palambak is not easy, and some time ago it was simply impossible because of the civil war in the province of Aceh in northern Sumatra, with which a small, always crowded boat goes to these parts. However, for those who have always dreamed of visiting a real desert island, all obstacles are surmountable.
Palambac Island is located in the Banyac archipelago and has a circumference of about 20 km, and there is only one hotel on it that guarantees a real VIP vacation for a few dollars a day. The hotel includes 4 double bungalows built at the end of 2010, as well as a restaurant with a chef. The hotel is called Banyak Island Bungalows and it even has its own website.
This is what the bungalow looks like from the outside. The house is built on stilts - like all buildings on such islands. This was done in case of rising water levels during high tides or floods.
This is what the bungalow looks like inside. A mosquito net on the bed is a must-have addition to any home in the tropics. Shower and toilet is located in a special house behind the bungalow. Inside you can see electrical wiring and lamps - from 6 to 10 pm the owner of the hotel starts a powerful generator, and at this time you can charge your laptop or camera. There is almost no telephone connection on the island, more precisely, only one operator works, with which Beeline does not have a roaming agreement, MTS should work in theory. Fresh water for the shower is generated using a desalinator.
The window offers a wonderful view of the Indian Ocean, located just a few meters from the threshold.
The bungalow has a cozy outdoor terrace with comfortable wicker chairs.
View from the terrace. The little sprouts are coconut trees planted by the owner of the hotel, which in 5 years will reach a height of five meters.
The restaurant has a varied selection of dishes (some, however, must be ordered in advance), you can also take any book for free, rent a surf, fins, a mask for a modest amount, or book an excursion to any point of the Banyac archipelago. Also, there is always a supply of Bintang beer in a special container-refrigerator. Food, drink and services can be ordered without money - everything ordered is recorded in a special notebook, on which a check is written during the checkout. The average cost of meals is about two dollars per serving. Can of beer - two and a half. You can shush and order royal lobsters - but it's very expensive, almost $20 per kilo.
We are here! Pay attention to the unusual location of the continents on the map.
Coconut palms grow everywhere around the hotel and on its territory, you can pick up coconuts, open them and drink coconut milk until you get bored)
The endless beach stretches the entire circumference of the island, occasionally interrupted by coral reefs or fallen palm trunks.
The ocean can be admired endlessly. And you can take fins, a mask and a snorkel, and swim right next to the hotel, looking at the fish fussing around the coral reefs.
If you can’t sit on the beach, then you can go to explore the island. Here the skeleton of the boat washed up on the shore.
Around the skeleton of the boat and through it such lovely flowers grow - exactly the same as those that enveloped the cars that had served their lives on the outskirts of Berastagi. Mystic!
In this reservoir, connected to the sea by a small river at high tide, very strange creatures are found (but more on that in the next post)
Here the waves washed up on the beach a giant log, reminiscent of the one from which Robinson unsuccessfully hollowed out a pirogue in Daniel Defoe's novel.
The woven roots of an unknown tree resemble a three-dimensional web
Some palm trees are devoid of vegetation - this is a consequence of the 2004 tsunami
fallen palm trees
The beach is so deserted and endless that you can even walk naked, the main thing is not to forget about sunscreen,
and also about the fact that sometimes fishing boats pass by, from which the locals examine white strangers with interest.
In some places on the island there are traces of life - bungalows destroyed many years ago, decayed bridges of the pier.
Sometimes fishermen spend the night at the far end of the island
One evening, fishing enthusiasts from the capital of Sumatra, Medan, sailed to our island.
The fishermen turned out to be Chinese - representatives of the local wealthy class. They came from Medan by car (the journey takes 9 hours) and rented a local boat for fishing, and when they saw our fire, they decided to moor and chat. To start a dialogue, they gave us some huge fish, very expensive by local standards. The fish was immediately skinned with a huge machete. We ate this fish for a few more days with the whole island :)
We lit a giant fire and talked peacefully.
Boats at sunset.
A bit more.
Another sunset on our beach
Dawn in the ocean
Sunset in the same place. At these latitudes, the sun sets at about 5:30 pm.
The case helped. One of my acquaintances, a New Zealand captain, drove a small fishing schooner from Vero Beach to Honduras. When I approached him and began to complain that I could still buy something in the twentieth century, but in the twenty-first I can’t pull it anymore - it turned out to be expensive for some century - the captain looked at me like a child and literally helped me two weeks to find the ground under their feet.
We left Vero Beach and headed for Costa Rica. There are a bunch of uninhabited islands in the southwest of the Gulf of Mexico. The captain is very experienced - he walks around this region all his life. He picked up a small island for me, which, according to some maps, belongs to Costa Rica, according to others - to Venezuela, and according to others - to Holland. That is, no one still really can not say to whom exactly. And if you think that this is such a unique phenomenon, you are mistaken, the world is full of islands, which, even if they belong to someone, are empty. Come on them and live - in English there is even a special term for people like me invented - " islandsquatters "- in Russian, probably" occupiers "I would say - a lot of people already live like that - if you don't believe me, then google" islandsquatters ' and see for yourself. While you are saving money for your apartment, people are taking over the islands with might and main.
Well, he unloaded me on the island, and in a couple of days I adjusted my whole life. Before leaving, I bought a used modular house for the tropics from one German literally for a penny (I gave away three Baku pieces). It consists of shields that are twisted with bolts and placed on steel pipes - a house half a meter from the ground. This is so that any tropical living creatures do not crawl into it. We dug eight holes, stuck support pipes there and filled it with cement. The water nearby - a small waterfall a hundred meters from my home - pours constantly.
After that, I unpacked, pulled out the kitchen utensils, assembled the bed and connected the toilet to a portable tank on the roof. The toilet is right in the house, you don’t have to go outside, otherwise you’ll go out at night to need it and some other creature will bite your leg - it’s safer in the house.
After that, he dug another pole and put a satellite dish on it - two-ton Internet from " directnet "- it works anywhere in North and South America. Now I have a phone via Skype and a decent stream - one and a half megabytes per second. Works like a clock and costs a penny - eighty dollars a month without traffic restrictions. Now I can work on the Internet, download videos and chat with friends for free.
The island turned out to be decent along the coast full of pow-pows, coconuts and guava. They can be safely eaten without fear of any chemicals and herbicides. I bought a good diving kit and spear (48 bucks). I must say right away that you should definitely have a copy of the Fish of the Atlantic on hand (30 bucks at the Barnes and Noble store) - everything is detailed there, what you can eat and what not - otherwise you can get poisoned out of habit.
I installed a solar oven for cooking. The thing is awesome - google " solaroven » at leisure - it does not require any fuel, it works from the sun. It costs a hundred and fifty. I bake fish under pineapple in it - both for free. True, you quickly get tired of pineapples - I alternate pineapple with pow-pow.
After I settled down, I went around the whole island - I took small plastic tags and took an inventory of all the coconut trees - there must be order in order to know exactly where and what you grow. Coconuts are a cool thing, you can make coconut oil from them - I fry fish on it.
Well, in case one of the officials suddenly comes to me, he developed a legend - for Costa Ricans I say that I am a caretaker from Venezuela, for Venezuelans - that I am a representative of the Dutch government. In the most extreme case, I have a special corruption fund in my locker - you know, officials are all people, in our time you can corrupt anyone, if you wish.
This is how you can solve your housing problem. It’s easy to find a list of habitable islands, and modern technology allows you to even inspect your future possessions without leaving your home - go to Google, turn on the view from space and in the evening plan with the whole family where to put the house and where the cattle corral - everything is fine from space it is seen. If possible, ask the architect to develop an individual plan based on the terrain. Pay attention to the fact that the island you have chosen has fresh water - a stream or a lake. Just in case, take a portable solar watermaker with you - it will not hurt.
If the Caribbean does not suit you - go to the Pacific Ocean, let's say to Apia or Nukualofa - and look around - there are a lot of opportunities there. Micronesia is just still untouched virgin lands, but what is Micronesia there - spin around Tahiti and pick up something for yourself.
Well, if you really want adventures - wind on the distant Murray.
Most importantly, when you move, do not overload the ship with things - try to adhere to the principle that if one or another object does not fit there, then it is most likely not needed. Do not get carried away with complex household appliances - if, say, your dishwasher breaks down, then there will be no one on the island to fix it. Get into the habit of doing as much as possible with your own hands.
The only thing - do not hesitate, otherwise, in computer terms, you will be left with a hole from Google - if everyone rushes, then there may not be enough islands for everyone.
Postscript: Yesterday I attacked a native. Sitting on a creeper in the jungle wearing a cane loincloth and eating pow-pow. I lured her with a can of Coca-Cola from a tree and dragged it home - whatever you want, savages are savages - they react instantly to cans. The native looks strange - all black as pitch, her eyes are narrow, narrow, and her hair is white. All in some kind of native hieroglyphs, apparently here they have it so accepted. Here I am writing these lines to you, and she is sitting in my corner and looking plaintively at the computer. He babbles something in his native language and stretches his hands towards him. “Ai shi teru” constantly repeats, kissing climbs, and she glances at the computer. But I constantly beat her on the hands and drive her away from the computer, - you know, the equipment in the hands of a savage is a piece of metal, let him go to collect coconuts so that in the evening I have something to fry mahi-mahi.