Great question, and the answer is volcanoes and potatoes. The island was discovered in 1506 by a Portuguese explorer who couldn’t be bothered to land, but by 1810, an American named Jonathan Lambert showed up and declared himself “sole possessor.” He quickly drowned, which tells you the island has a dark sense of humor.
Today, about 250 people call this windy rock home. They are almost all descended from a handful of British soldiers and shipwreck survivors who decided that living with 24-hour wind gusts was better than going back to fighting Napoleon. The community has seven family names, so you’d better hope you like your cousin’s cooking because you’ll be marrying into the same pool.
What’s the Daily Life Like?
Imagine waking up in a place where the weather is so aggressive that trees cannot grow. That’s right—Tristan da Cunha is a treeless, windswept volcanic lump where the tallest things are the residents holding onto their hats. They eat a lot of crayfish, which they export to Japan, and they use the internet via a satellite connection that’s slower than a sloth on a treadmill.
There’s one grocery store, one pub, one school, and one police officer—who hasn’t had to arrest anyone in years because where would they run to? The local pub is called the “Albany,” and on Friday nights, the island’s entire population of 250 basically shows up. If you get too drunk and rowdy, you’re not going to jail; you’re getting a stern talking-to from your third cousin.
Isolated Locations at Patricia Witcher blog
Mail comes by boat once every two months. Imagine ordering something from Amazon and waiting sixty days, only to find out the package fell overboard in a storm. That’s not a tragedy there; it’s a Tuesday.
