Oceans¶
Places that are "in between", out in two very different oceans: the South Atlantic and the Arctic Ocean.
- Coins
- 15
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Mauritius¶- Coins
- 4
The Republic of Mauritius is an island nation in the south-west Indian Ocean, about 900 km east of Madagascar. Part of the Mascarene Islands archipelego formed by volcanoes 8-10 million years ago, Mauritius is surrounded by coral reefs and appears to be not only a tropical paradise, but an economically well-developed and politically well-managed country. Plus, they make lots of rum there AND when you Google the country name, their tourism board's site is number one, ahead of the Wikipedia entry.
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Spitsbergen¶- Coins
- 6
Spitsbergen (sometimes mispelled "Spitzbergen"), part of the Svalbard archipelego, is a barren mountainous island -- the name means "pointy peaks" -- in the Arctic Ocean that is closer to the North Pole than it is to the Arctic Circle. Lots of countries squabbled over this territory, mainly due to whaling interests, and in 1920 it was agreed it would go to Norway (almost 600 km due south).
There may be up to three settlements on the island, or there may only be one active settlement left today. It would be hard to hang around a place where night basically starts in late October and lasts until mid-February.
The Russian mining company Arktikugol set up camp here in 1932, and issued coins (tokens, really) for the workers in 1946, 1993, and 1998.
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St. Helena¶- Coins
- 5
Saint Helena is a very tiny island almost 2,000 km of the west coat of Africa. Its dependent, Ascension, is a burnt out volcano located over 1,000 km north-west. Saint Helena was first found by the Portuguese in 1509. They planted fruit trees, vegetables, and left a lot of animals, but didn't hang out themselves. The Dutch and British squabbled over the island around 1673, but as usual Britain won out. Meanwhile, Ascension was pretty much ignored but today has a population of over 1,000 people who live with lots of sea turtles and birds. Their main source of income is phosphates and bird poo. Meanwhile, back at Saint Helena we find a parade of trouble-causers who got kicked out of other places, including Napolean, some Zulu chiefs, and an ex-sultan of Zanzibar. In 2005 the Jehovah Witnesses reported amazing success on Saint Helena with approximately 1 in 29 people signing up, the highest ratio in the world.
