Cruises are taking trips to a completely made-up island - and tourists are desperate to see it
Topics: Science, World News, Cruise ship
Britt Jones
Featured Image Credit: Getty Stock Photo
Topics: Science, World News, Cruise ship
There’s a place on Earth that you can visit, but it technically doesn’t exist due to its location.
Ever hopped on a cruise ship, only to be told you’re about to go nowhere to see nothing?
That’s what passengers of the 2023-2024 Viking World Cruise experienced.
Having boarded the ship which sailed off the coast of West Africa, Russell and Gail Lee found themselves on a path set for Null Island – a place you probably have never heard of.
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While it is a ‘place’ you can go, per se... it’s not actually an island at all.
In fact, it’s a whole lot of nothing, but what makes it special is its coordinates.
Situated at zero degrees latitude and zero degrees longitude, this point is known to cartographers as Null Island and was essentially named as a joke on mapping software errors.
The location sits where both the equator and prime meridian intersect, and the Lees have both been there to see it.
According to the couple, the excursion took them to the rarely visited spot, which shows you a vast expanse of the South Atlantic Ocean.
However, it’s not something you are able to access easily, so being able to get there is usually only done via a long-haul boat journey.
“Everyone had their geolocators out, counting down … 0.01… 0.005 … 0.0001,” Gail told CNN Travel of her experience. “We were all comparing phones. Whoever took a selfie closest to 0, 0 got bragging rights.”
Known by a small cult following over the years, Null Island has gained a somewhat notoriety online due to miscoded information being wrongly associated with its coordinates.
For example, unsolved crimes, or Bermuda mysteries, can be linked to Null Island, despite it being a big old place of nothing.
The island began to first make its appearance in the Geographic Information Systems community around 2008 when geospatial data became more widely used.
When incomplete or missing data gets logged to mapping software, it tends to default to null, placing it at 0.0 - creating Null Island.
Two years later, in 2010, GeoIQ was working on new maps, when Mike Migurski, a geospatial data specialist, took inspiration from the game ‘Myst,’ to add a small island shape at 0, 0 so that others could find it.
“It helped crystallize for people that it was something you could picture,” Migurski told the outlet. “We didn’t do any kind of explicit reference. it was just an ‘If you know, you know,’ thing.”
From there, Null Island was born, and the mapping world took it and ran with it – making it an inside joke.
With a handful of cruise liners now adding it to its schedule, this means that devoted fans of the oddity can now see it up close and personal.
Like on the Holland America tour in 2028, which will see the ‘island’ during the 129-day trip.
Just don’t be disappointed if it’s not what you were expecting.
“There is no ‘there’ there,” Russell said. “There’s really nothing. Just open sea. But you’re some of the only people on Earth ever to visit, and that is really special.”