Seal-fishing update
25 April 2018 04:04 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
igenlodeI've more or less decided (yet again) not to switch timelines back to Raoul at the end of the chapter... when I eventually reach it. It just makes the whole business of trying to work out who was where when much too complicated, though I do still need to have a general idea of elapsed time for my own purposes. So the current intention is to end on the 'cliff-hanger' of Erik's illness, but without using this as a window of opportunity to change viewpoints; I'll just go straight on to Christine's desperation and eventual release in the next chapter.
Meanwhile my 1911 encyclopædia supplies the following hard facts (thank heaven for old reference works!): "By the Seal Fisheries Act 1875 the season for seal-fishing between 67 and 68° N lat. and 5°E and 17°W long. begins on April 3" and "By the Bering Sea Award Act no fur seals may be killed between May 1 and July 1 N of lat. 35° and E of long. 180° until the water boundary of the United States and Russia is reached" -- the latter reference is aimed at preserving the seal stocks for Russian use, of course, but I assume it reflects the period during which the Russians were expecting to hunt them.
So it looks as if it would be reasonable for Raoul to get picked up by a sealer heading homewards to Tromsø in mid-May -- thank goodness. Ironically that also cuts down considerably the amount of extra time I need to allow for him to get round the top of Norway and travel down from the Arctic, so he probably could probably set off on his small-boat trip at the same time as Christine escapes...
Meanwhile my 1911 encyclopædia supplies the following hard facts (thank heaven for old reference works!): "By the Seal Fisheries Act 1875 the season for seal-fishing between 67 and 68° N lat. and 5°E and 17°W long. begins on April 3" and "By the Bering Sea Award Act no fur seals may be killed between May 1 and July 1 N of lat. 35° and E of long. 180° until the water boundary of the United States and Russia is reached" -- the latter reference is aimed at preserving the seal stocks for Russian use, of course, but I assume it reflects the period during which the Russians were expecting to hunt them.
So it looks as if it would be reasonable for Raoul to get picked up by a sealer heading homewards to Tromsø in mid-May -- thank goodness. Ironically that also cuts down considerably the amount of extra time I need to allow for him to get round the top of Norway and travel down from the Arctic, so he probably could probably set off on his small-boat trip at the same time as Christine escapes...