People travel just fine with a Mercator map where Greenland is larger than Africa and Antarctica is a massive landmass larger than all of the continents put together. What makes you think that travel would not be possible on another model?
Ah - another "Educating Tom" moment!
The reason Mercator projections are used (they are actually DESIGNED for maritime navigation) is that Mercator projections preserve ANGLES at the price of making DISTANCES appear wildly distorted. If you're navigating by compass and stars - then angles matter very much to you - but distances less so.
FE maps other than Mercator preserve neither angles nor distances - which makes them "wrong" rather than useful.
In fact, it's impossible to make an FE map that correctly preserves both angles and distances as compared to the RE world.
This results in desperate FE proponents having to argue that headings (compass/astronomical/solar) and distances (GPS, airlines, etc) are somehow being mistaken by all of the professional people who rely on them.
So please don't trot out nonsense you don't understand Tom. You WILL be called on it from now on.