There has been a continuing conundrum here at Socotra House about how many times we have been around the world. For a crowd composed of students and military retirees you can imagine it is a widespread assortment of jogs and flights and white water under the bows of warships.

But connecting the various dots has been a matter of speculation. We pnce sailed west from Yokosuka, Japan, to Nairobi, Kenya. It included a southerly transit of the Equator, with a stop in Australia to break up the boredom.

Splash and Rocket had been PACFLT sailors, so crossing the broad waters was a matter of routine while the Atlantic was memorable mostly due to the NATO conference in London that rip-roaring Cold War Victory time in 1990.

Time zones being what they are, these were not trips around the world, though of course they were. Modern travel by jet means a half day’s flight to have lunch halfway around the world is not unusual. Doing it on one ship on one voyage would be impressive, though Vic needed more than one voyage and one ship.

Here is his story. He bases his claim on several ships, a locomotive from Mombasa to Nairobi and some anonymous Boeing products, he thought he had been around by going West and East. He usually wound up in East Africa on a locomotive in the old British colonial corridor.

On USS Forrestal, he got to Haifa in the Med. On USS Midway he got to Mombasa. That is the basis of his claim of circumnavigation, but it had never occurred to him to simply check the longitude of cities in Israel and Kenya.

Actually, he did one time but realized that he did not completely understand the International Date line, or why things were normally abbreviated with an “E” or a “W” after the fuzzy numbers. So, the difference between a degree or two in the east Med and Africa was “close enough for Government Work.”

There was beer money on the table and a challenge to sort things out in an irrefutable manner. We chose ChatGPT. Here goes:
Round the World: 80W to 35E.

This trip covered:
80+35=115 degrees of longitude heading east.

Segment 2: San Diego to Tokyo (Westbound)
Longitude range: By traveling west from San Diego, you crossed a significant portion of the Pacific Ocean and reached far into the Eastern Hemisphere. This voyage likely crossed the anti-meridian (the longitude line, opposite the Prime Meridian).

Segment 3: Tokyo to Nairobi (Westbound)
Longitude range: Approximately 140E to37E. This leg connected your position in the Eastern Hemisphere to a point very close to the Prime Meridian’s longitude (Nairobi is near), while the Prime Meridian is 0).

Connecting the Segments
Your travel from Nairobi (37∘E) to Florida via Haifa (35E), you have successfully traveled all around the world by longitude. You have crossed all 360 degrees of longitude.

Whew!

Copyright 2026 Vic Socotra

www.vicsocotra.com