Astrolabe Size 3

Origin: France

Year: 1811

Astrolabe was a horse barge converted to an exploration ship of the French Navy and was originally named Coquille. She is famous for her travels with Jules Dumont d’Urville. The name derives from a Voyage under the command of Louis Isidore Duperrey

Louis Isidore Duperrey commanded Coquille on its circumnavigation of the earth (1822-1825) with Jules Dumont d’Urville as second. René-Primevère Lesson also travelled on Coquille as a naval doctor and naturalist. On their return in March 1825, Lesson and Dumont brought back to France an imposing collection of animals and plants collected on the Falkland Islands, on the coasts of Chile and Peru, in the archipelagos of the Pacific and New Zealand, New Guinea and Australia.

Astrolabe Size 3

During the voyage the ship spent two weeks in the Bay of Islands in the north of New Zealand in 1824.On the return voyage to France the ship sailed through the Ellice Islands (now known as Tuvalu). Early navigational instrument, the astrolabe, a precursor to the sextant.

Find more Cruise Liners here