Pilgr(im)age
53° North 0° Confluence Point
This rather uninspiring view looks Northwards from a point approximately 3 miles North of my home in Boston, Lincolnshire UK. At first glance a typical field, one of hundreds in the heart of the fertile Lincolnshire Fens. This field however is special, because right before the camera lies the point where the lines of 53°N latitude and 0° longitude cross, known to geographers as a confluence point.
There are 64,442 such points on the Earth's surface, and you're never more than 49 miles from one. This particular point is the only one in Lincolnshire, and the most Northerly of three UK confluences that lie on the 0° Greenwich Meridian (the next one on land is in Alaska).
I've included the GPS reading from my Garmin navigator taken at this point displaying only integer numbers, no minutes or seconds. The display's second line suggests East, however that's only because I walked from that direction. The location is simply 0° because the Greewich Meridian is the World datum, it's neither East nor West.
Seeking out these points (a pursuit known as Confluence Hunting) has become popular worldwide, and an ongoing project to photograph all of the Earth's land confluence points can be found at
53° North 0° Confluence Point
This rather uninspiring view looks Northwards from a point approximately 3 miles North of my home in Boston, Lincolnshire UK. At first glance a typical field, one of hundreds in the heart of the fertile Lincolnshire Fens. This field however is special, because right before the camera lies the point where the lines of 53°N latitude and 0° longitude cross, known to geographers as a confluence point.
There are 64,442 such points on the Earth's surface, and you're never more than 49 miles from one. This particular point is the only one in Lincolnshire, and the most Northerly of three UK confluences that lie on the 0° Greenwich Meridian (the next one on land is in Alaska).
I've included the GPS reading from my Garmin navigator taken at this point displaying only integer numbers, no minutes or seconds. The display's second line suggests East, however that's only because I walked from that direction. The location is simply 0° because the Greewich Meridian is the World datum, it's neither East nor West.
Seeking out these points (a pursuit known as Confluence Hunting) has become popular worldwide, and an ongoing project to photograph all of the Earth's land confluence points can be found at