Specks of land were just as vital to our shipwrecked survivors

Not that they were easy to find

Only 1 of the Pacific is land

On 20th December

The sailors arrived on the Pitcairn Islands

Over 2 000 miles from where they were first shipwrecked

Described by them as a paradise before our very eyes

The starving sailors quickly set to work on the island's wildlife

But the good times were not to last

Within a week they had eaten all its seabirds

Leaving three of their group behind on this now impoverished island

The others chose to take their chances back at sea

They could have ridden the prevailing winds to the nearby Society Islands

But they were terrified of cannibals

Instead they struck out east

To the distant shores of South America

Two and a half thousand miles away

And back into the dreaded Desolate Region