Map the Journey

In 2014 Liechtenstein celebrated the Lindau Messenger, a courier service which journeyed from Lindau on Lake Constance to the Italian city of Milan. The countries it crossed, Germany, Austria and Switzerland also issued stamps in the same year.   The service carried mail, goods and passengers for around 500 years, ultimately finishing at the beginning of the 19th Century.   The arduous route crossing rivers, lakes and over the Alps would take 5½ days in good weather and the stamp in the middle of the maximum card lists the stops, including the highest point at the Splügen Pass (2113 metres).  The card shows a historical map of the area the Lindau Boten (Lindau Messsenger) travelled.  One of the most famous passengers who travelled with the Lindau Messenger was Goethe in 1788.

1957: David Thompson Death Centenary

Here is another well travelled person but on a monumental scale.  David Thompson mapped nearly 2 million square miles of North America, despite loosing the sight in one eye and having a limp due to a badly healed broken leg. His fascinating story, and a first day cover of the stamp, can be found on the Hudson Bay Company website here

1940: Centenary of British Sovereignty

Another map maker, Captain James Cook who coincidentally developed his skills in Canada by making charts of the St Lawrence River and surveying the Newfoundland coast (1760-1767) but of course is most famous for his mapping of New Zealand when he sailed around the coast.  Turning west and away from New Zealand in March 1770 he was looking for Van Diemans's Land (Tasmania) but was too far north and arrived at Port Hicks in what today is New Holland in Australia and there charted the east coast of Australia   

Here is the European who got there first in 1642, Abel Tasman, who task was to discover "the rich but mysterious Southern Continent" known as ‘Terra australis incognita'.  Planting the Dutch flag on Tasmania he sailed away due to bad weather and continued east to New Zealand's South Island leaving a legacy of place names.  New Zealand was shown on a world map for the first time in 1646.

An entry to Sunday Stamps II theme - Maps - journey to See It On A Postcard for more