Talisker, the famous single malt whisky distilled on the Isle of Skye has announced its sponsorship of an epic sailing adventure which will be the first to recreate the exact journey of Captain William Bligh's epic 4,000-mile open boat Mutiny on the Bounty voyage.
Led by Australian adventurer Don McIntyre and a crew of three in 25ft open boat, the reenactment will follow the journey across the Pacific from Tonga to Timor and aims to raise vital funds and awareness for the worlds first international research institute into Motor Neurone Disease, currently being built by the Sheffield Institute Foundation.
Then they plan to set off to sail across the top of the Fiji and the Vanuatu Island groups, before setting course for the Queensland Coast and a landing at Restoration Island following four weeks at sea on light rations. They then sail north inside the Great Barrier Reef to Thursday Island, and across to Kupang and Timor.
McIntyre returned to his roots and the roots of Talisker on the Isle of Skye to trace his Scottish ancestry, and hold a Clan reunion at the famous Talisker Distillery. His grandparents Thomas and Mary McIntyre emigrated to Australia shortly after their marriage in 1901 and this was Dons first visit to the island and Scotland.
The 54 year-old adventurer, who successfully sailed single-handed around the world in 1990-91 (BOC Challenge), has led a series of expeditions down to Antarctica in 2000, fly gyrocopters 13.5 thousand kilometers around Australia in 2007, brought with him the 25ft replica of the Bounty Boat to give his fellow McIntyres an insight into the extraordinary fight for survival that Captain Bligh and his crew faced following the infamous mutiny on HMS Bounty led by Fletcher Christian.
McIntyre and his three-man crew will face the same deprivations as the original Bounty Boat crew, with little food, no charts or toilet paper and only the limited navigation implements that were available to Bligh.
They will start the adventure on the same day (April 28th), at the same time and in the same place (some 1,300 miles west of Tahiti, near Tonga) 221 years after the original mutiny journey.
By the way, Don McIntyre has loaned Jessica Watson the S&S 34 that is now known as Ella's Pink Lady and Mike Perham has signed on as second in command on the Talisker Bounty boat !
(see yesterday blog about world’s Youngest Solo Circumnavigator)
Links :
No comments:
Post a Comment