Posted by Adam Quinan on February 03, 2012 at 05:40:29 user Adam.
In Reply to: Re: Conspiracy explanation (Re: problem with dates) posted by Robert Hill on February 02, 2012 at 09:28:43:
In my opinion, one of the best pieces of sailing writing in all of Ransome's books and there are a good many, is the description of the night sail down the channel with the Viper in close proximity. It starts out with a simple description of the lights and headlands and how you navigate by night in coastal waters using them. There is also the exciting chase and near boarding episode when the Viper closes them in the dark.
But I am wondering where Ransome picked up his knowledge. We know he sailed in the dark aboard Racundra in the Baltic, but I can't recall whether he ever sailed in the Channel before he wrote PD. Did he just study the Channel Pilot book and work out in his imagination what it would have been like, based on his Baltic experience, or had actually cruised those waters at some time?