The only reference to the Mayflower was in connection as to how long it took to get back and forth across the North Atlantic against and with the Gulf Stream and the stormy weather encountered and how much faster the return trip was. We are talking about travel time and nothing more. If the Ark and Dove took the same route at the same time of the year they would have encountered the same problems. 

Note that 100 to 200 years later the fast clipper ships only made 3 MPH on the trip from England to the US. Only with steam ships was the northern passage made faster. Many of them went over the top north of the Gulf Stream with a whole new set of problems ice burgs as the Titanic found out.

As Meteorologist for Commander Second Fleet I  sailed these routes back and forth 3 times aboard a large Navy Command Ship during the Sep-Oct period during the early 1980s including once over the top.  I can verify that it indeed is a stormy and dangerous trip especially for such small ships as the Ark, Dove and Mayflower. In some of the storms they would have encountered 40 to 60 foot seas and hurricane force winds.

The 1600s were also during the cold of the Little Ice Age (coldest points 1650, 1770, 1800/1870) while the Vikings made their trips over the top during the Medieval Climate Optimum (10th-14th century) when it was as or warmer than it is today. You should also take into account these cold periods when Americans were moving westward across the US, travel in winter would not have been easy. I remember reading in Weather Wise magazine that Chesapeake Bay was frozen solid in the 1800s enough that a train engine was placed on a barge and pulled from Baltimore MD to Norfolk VA.

The Spanish and Portuguese took the easier Trade Route down the West Coast of African then with the NE Trade Winds to the West Indies. This way you had sea currents and winds mostly in your favor all the way. 

I doubt that many Americans today would even think of undertaking such  dangerous crossings in such small vessels as out ancestors did. Our ancestors were indeed determined, bold and courageous men, women and children regardless of which colony they were going to.

Clay Gullatt
USN Ret.


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