January 16, 2007--Bagelea

Just when we bought our dream place on Mallorca, right smack in the middle of the Mediterranean, it is looking as if we made a bad real estate deal. We thought that we would not only like it there but also that it would prove to be a good long-term investment.

However, it now appears that it will not turn out to be such a smart investment. It seems that the Mediterranean is scheduled to disappear. Literally.

But there is some good news, if there can be in such a scenario--it will take a while before this happens. About 250 million years. So we should have plenty of time to enjoy it there, sell it, and maybe even turn a profit.

You may be surprised to learn that the fate of the Mediterranean is not another one of Al Gore's inconvenient truths. If anything, according to Al Gore, after all the Arctic ice melts the Mediterranean should swell to the size of the Pacific Ocean and our flat on Mallorca, as well as our New York City apartment, should become waterfront property, and thus much more valuable.

The end of the Mediterranean, however, will be the result of another, even more powerful geological phenomenon--continental compression. It is scheduled to happen not because of global warming but because of shifting plate tectonics. (NY Times story linked below.)

About 200 million years ago, all six of our current continents were fused together into a single land mass call Pangea. Then Pangea began to break up into separate land masses, each floating about on its own tectonic plate so that by just 100 million years ago North America, Europe, and Asia became pretty much a continent of their own; South America and Africa were still semi-attached with only a narrow body of water between them—the early Atlantic Ocean; and India was drifting north on its own plate, heading for what we now think of as Asia where it eventually slammed so hard that the force of that collision caused the Himalayas to rise to their current towering majesty.

But before we get too comfortable with the current map of the globe, and our various deeds and property lines, using new models to spec out the future of the earth, scientists are uncovering evidence that today’s continents are about to make a U Turn: During the next 250 million years they will drift back toward each other and eventually crash into one another, re-forming a single land mass.

Some are calling this Pangea Ultima; others, since it appears that the new landmass will encircle what is now the Indian Ocean, prefer to refer to it, because of this water hole, as Donutea or Bagelea.

I suspect you know my preference.

But ultimately there is another piece of good news—with the continents separated as they are at present, it takes about 11 hours to get from here to Mallorca; and if we use frequent-flier miles we have to cash in about 80,000 miles each. With all the continents bunched together as they will be, New York and Palma, Mallorca will be so close together that it probably will take only about two hours to get there.

And on Jet Blue it will cost a mere $65 each way, in today’s dollars. So we won’t even need to use frequent-flier miles.