The Totorore Voyage by Gerry Clark - 1988

Auckland, New Zealand: Century Hutchinson, 1988. Soft cover. Near Fine/Very Good. 357 pages Colour photographs, maps. One of the most remarkable small boat adventures of all time The Totorore expedition was conceived as a circum-Antarctic voyage to study the seabirds of the Southern Ocean in order to further their conservation. Clark spent seven years building the 10m yacht Totorore (the Maori name for the Antarctic Prion) of kauri timber, completing and launching her in 1982. The Totorore left Kerikeri on 26 February 1983, eventually returning on 6 November 1986, 3 years, 8 months and 16 days later, having travelled some 71,000 km eastwards, around and about the Southern Ocean and the Antarctic Peninsula, visiting numerous islands to survey and count seabirds. The most significant ornithological work was carried out in southern Chile where new colonies of several species were discovered, and in South Georgia where comprehensive and accurate counts were made of Wandering Albatrosses and King Penguins along the long coastline. During much of the expedition Clark was accompanied and aided by one or two companions, but sometimes, as on a late leg of the voyage between Marion Island and Fremantle, Australia, he was alone and frequently imperilled by rough seas and equipment failure. For the next twelve years Clark continued his interest in seabird conservation and New Zealands subantarctic islands by making numerous trips in the Totorore to assist researchers from the Department of Conservation to count, map and study seabirds. It was in the course of one these expeditions, to recover satellite transponders used to track albatrosses breeding on the Antipodes Islands, that the Totorore disappeared on about 12 June 1999 off the south coast of Antipodes Island, along with Clark and his companion Roger Sale