I never cease to tire when reading people’s wacky and bizarre tales found at the Degree
Confluence Project (DCP). You’re bound to find something new, another story, success and
adventure in finding possibly nothing, if only maybe yourself, a cow, a middle-class neighborhood in the burbs, or
maybe even a run in with border patrol. I envy these people, determined in their quests to seek out latitudes and
longitudes in spots tucked away in Romanian fields with a GPS device. And Romanian fields is exactly what
Phil Sharpe saw when he arrived at his latest confluence of
47 degrees north, 28 degrees east. The
area sits right outside of the Moldova border and is frequented by a passing farmer or two. Apparently Phil
hung around too long making brief simple Romanian conversation with a friendly old gentleman, while the last one he ran
into became pretty hostile. We’ll say poor communication.
His confluence story gets better as he makes a dash for the van and tells his partner to speed off only to be
greeted by the police up the road. They were overly suspicious of his high-tech camera, used to photograph the
confluence and his satellite photo of Romania and it’s bordering countries. Imagine trying to explain that to someone
in a foreign language. It’s plain hilarious and luckily things worked out for Phil and his pal who later took
a picture with the police.
Hands down, Phil has one of the best stories at DCP, I’ve seen in a long time.