Being 42

Saturday 18th January 2025, 5.10pm (day 4,895)

St Helena sits in such a vast expanse of uninterrupted ocean that sea conditions can often have no direct relationship to what the weather is like locally. The atmosphere was calm today, a beautiful day of weather (in fact, all of them have been, since I came here, except for one bout of mild drizzle last Wednesday afternoon). But the sea…. that was a different story.

“Rollers” are the local name for waves driven by storms way to the north, like off Canada, or Florida, and which just roll down the ocean for thousands of miles until hitting this small lump of rock that happens to be in the way. On one day in February 1846 (see this page) the rollers were so intense that they took out half of Jamestown and about thirty moored vessels. They weren’t quite that bad this afternoon but still, it’s noticeable no one was parking their cars on the wharf.