How did early explorers survive long voyages

During the early days of our ancestors, discovering new lands had always been a case of just walking for long enough until you reached somewhere you wanted to stay. The problem with this method was that people were limited to the island or continent they were on because it would take the human race thousands of years of development to be able to build ships capable of traversing the world’s oceans.

(Ships like this did not start to appear until the 1700s, with ships during the 15th century being significantly slower and more uncomfortable)

It wasn’t until 1492 that Christopher Columbus landed on a small island in the Bahamas, and he is widely known as being the first European to officially visit the Americas, though a Viking named Leif Erickson is believed to have landed somewhere in Canada after leaving his home in Greenland to go exploring.

So why did it take humans so long to be able to sail across the seas?

The two simple answers would be ship quality and supplies. It wasn’t until the late medieval period that ships were strong enough to be able to withstand storms at sea, but even at this point food and water were the biggest concerns. It was very risky storing water in barrels as it could turn stagnant or become spoiled through insects, mold on the wood, or a whole number of other reasons.

How long was a voyage from Europe to America?

During the late 1700s, it would take an average of two months to travel from England to New York. The journey could be as quick as six weeks on one of the faster vessels like a cutter, but it could also be as long as three months on some of the slower-moving supply ships and larger vessels.

(Disease and starvation were ever present on early ships, with such confined spaces it wasn’t possible to leave, and an illness could run rampant with a vessel)

Other factors for the lack of ocean travel before the 1500s

One of the main reasons people didn’t want to try and find new lands to the west was because no one knew what was there, and convincing someone to sail across what they believed to be endless water was no easy task. Another major factor was that medieval ships were built like small forts and often had parapets and defenses not suited to sailing long distances. The boats of the medieval period or earlier were simply too poorly built to make the journey, with one good example being the attempted Roman invasion of Britain in 55 BCE. After initially being fought off, the Romans tried to cross back across the English Channel, only to find their entire fleet spread over a hundred miles along the north European shore. Even though their civilization was the most advanced in the world at the time, they still didn’t have ships good enough to cross 50 miles of water effectively.

So how would someone survive sailing across an ocean?

A strong ship, something safe to drink, and food that takes a very long time to go bad are the keys to making it across an ocean, but preservable food didn’t exactly come in a huge variety at a time when there was no such thing as refrigeration or dehydration machines.

What did they drink?

There were only two options available alongside alcohol, but drinking that alone would leave you dehydrated, which would eventually kill you. Water was put in charred barrels that were sealed with tar or wax after the lid was put on to make it airtight, everyone on the ship would drink from the same barrel until it was empty, which would minimize the amount of time the water was exposed to the air and had a chance to go bad.

The other thing to drink, which was much more popular was called small beer. It was just a normal beer that had a very low ABV content, usually between 0.5% and 1.5%. The reason this was so popular was because the alcohol would stop the liquid from going bad, making it safer to store for longer. It would also contain calories to supplement your diet, but the low alcohol content wasn’t enough to leave someone dehydrated. During the 1500s in the British navy, the standard ration for a sailor was one pound of hard tack and one gallon of small beer each day.

What did they eat?

Dried grain can last for years if stored properly and can be mixed into any liquid dish or ground into flour for fresh bread.

Hardtack, also known as ship’s biscuit, was the most popular sailing food as it didn’t need to be cooked and could be safe to eat for years. It’s a flat and very dense piece of bread that has been baked for a long time to remove all the moisture. This makes it last for years but also makes it extremely hard. There are stories of soldiers during the American Civil War who had to smash their hard tack up with their rifle stocks to grind it into a powder for making soup. Usually, it had to be soaked or dipped in milk to make it soft enough to chew, but this was often the only option for anyone who wasn’t rich.

(A piece of hard tack being made, the holes are put in to help moisture escape)

Dried peas and beans can last for several months, but usually, they weren’t available for most people. Anyone who farmed would normally be growing grain or staple vegetables, with dried peas and beans being saved for those with a little more money.

Stockfish are just dried fish that have been drying for a very long time to remove as much moisture as possible. This makes it last for months but also makes it impossible to eat without soaking it for several hours.

Salt pork can last for up to six months if made properly and stored correctly, but the problem comes with making it safe to eat. If consumed directly, the salt content would make someone feel very ill, or at the least leave them dehydrated. To avoid this, the pork must be soaked in water that has to be changed several times to get rid of the excess salt, which made it an unpopular choice on any ship that didn’t have excess water supplies.

Potted meat can be safe for up to two months if made correctly, and doesn’t need to be cooked before eating, with the most popular choices being duck or beef.

(Some homemade potted meat, beef minced together with fat and salt. The top then has a layer of melted butter or fat poured on to form an airtight seal.)

The cheese was often brought when it was still maturing, so its optimum eating stage would be part way through the journey.

Fresh food was taken for the initial part of the journey, with all kinds of fresh vegetables, meats, and dairy products being loaded on board. Unfortunately, these wouldn’t last long and would only see the first month at best, leaving up to two months left of open sea with nothing more to eat than the above.

As boring as it may sound, surviving a long voyage would all come down to supplies and how long they would last. The longest voyage anyone had to do without the option to resupply was the journey between Eastern Europe and the east coast of America. Journeys longer than this would often follow a coastline and have set points for resupplying, with the Atlantic Ocean being the only place it wasn’t possible to do so.