Charles Darwin’s legendary voyage to Australia and beyond recreated

A two-year voyage to reflect on and add to the discoveries of Charles Darwin nearly two centuries ago will visit Australia.

Sydneysider Stewart McPherson, the founder and project manager of Darwin200, at Plymouth on Tuesday. Picture: Jacquelin Magnay.

A two-year voyage to reflect on and add to the discoveries of Charles Darwin nearly two centuries ago – and which will visit Australia ahead of the 2024 Sydney-to-Hobart – was to leave ­Plymouth under light winds on Tuesday.

The global environmental campaign, which is centred on the century-old Dutch tall ship Oosterschelde, will trace much of the route of the Beagle, the Royal Navy ship which Darwin, then just 22, joined in 1831 and conducted five years of experiments.

Stewart McPherson, a British naturalist who lives in Sydney with his Australian wife and children, has discovered 30 species and written scores of books about the natural world, but this project, visiting 32 locations and titled Darwin200, is his most ­ambitious yet.

“It doesn’t feel real after 10 years of an idea, of which four has been very hard work,’’ he told The Australian at Plymouth dock.

“This beautiful historic tall ship resonates adventure. We are putting adventure into science. She starts this epic journey in Charles Darwin’s wake.”

Young conservationists, one from each of 200 countries, will undertake studies at various ports of the journey. They will focus on the state of the sea, including the damage done by plastics, and ­assess the health of the species Darwin examined.

The ship will host weekly classroom lessons for students around the world based on eight research areas.

“These young conservationists on the project are special people, they have a burning flame inside of them to change the world,” Mr McPherson said.

The Sydney and Hobart legs of the journey, expected around December 2024, will include analysing sea and air temperatures and trawling for plastic particles.

Each water sample will be filtered and concentrations of micro-plastics will be studied, classified and recorded. Another area of study will be seabirds, ­cetaceans (whales, dolphins and porpoises), pinnipeds (seals and sea lions) and other megafauna (basking sharks, whale sharks, sunfish and rays) to help understand the movement of endangered species across the Pacific.

The Australian stop will also be a chance for the scientists and crew to re-set before the toughest leg travelling west to east from Christchurch, under Cape Horn to the Falkland Islands before ­visiting South Georgia and Tristan da Cunha.

Darwin’s voyage had been delayed for many months because the Beagle was undergoing strengthening to deal with the huge seas of Cape Horn. The Darwin200 voyage is also well prepared for this aspect of the adventure.

“Obviously Sydney to Hobart is known for its rough waters across Bass Strait, but that’s nothing compared to leg 27 from Christchurch and across the ­entire Southern Ocean to the bottom of the Pacific, under Cape Horn in about six weeks of sailing, including between the notoriously brutal latitudes of 40 ­degrees and 50 degrees,’’ Mr McPherson said.

“That is intense, that is rough, that is some of the Roaring 40s and Furious 50s – she’ll be going through all of that. That’s a real hardcore leg.”

Darwin spent five years on the Beagle, developing his theory of natural selection, but he suffered terribly with seasickness.

Mr McPherson laughed, saying he too struggled at times with his sea legs: “I do get seasick, and, yes, Darwin hated sailing, he hated his time on the Beagle. He was known as the landsman on board, because as soon as they berthed he was straight off.’’

McPherson said the project’s budget was $8m, of which half was the cost of the ship. Money was raised by selling some of the ship berths on various legs, while the rest had come from philanthropy and sponsorship.

He said the Oosterschelde was stopping at every major port Darwin visited except for Mauritius and Cocos. “Sadly it would have added a million euros more to go across the Indian Ocean and ­Darwin stopped only very briefly in Mauritius, but we are doing every other major port he has done,’’ he said.