Voyage of the Harrier

One of the most important ocean voyages in history was the circumnavigation of the world by the survey ship HMS Beagle in the early 1830s, with Charles Darwin aboard as ship's naturalist. Darwin's account, published in 1839 as Voyage of the Beagle, has never been out of print. 

Voyage of the Harrier, is the story of the first detailed re-enactment ever made of the Beagle's famous voyage. Between 2001 and 2012 the author in his small sailing yacht Harrier went to nearly every port used, and almost every anchorage visited, by the Beagle. Harrier's voyage was guided in detail by Robert FitzRoy's Narrative and Darwin's Beagle Diary. The Beagle's voyage involved much labourious survey work and it saw the beginning of Darwin's personal development as a scientist. Harrier's voyage included a shipwreck and an attack by smugglers in the Timor Sea. 


The author's book, Voyage of the Harrier, combines accounts of the Beagle and Harrier voyages in such a way that the two voyages cast light upon one another. Together, the two narratives help to illuminate the world.