Super nipper

Australian Jesse Martin, who on October 31 1999 at the age of 18 became the youngest person in history to circumnavigate the globe single handed, non-stop and unassisted (see above), is to set out on a new adventure.

The voyage grandly entitled, the Journey of Kijana (Swahili for 'young people'), will kick off in February on board a 54ft cutter and return to Australia in April 2004. This time Martin will not be alone - he will be taking his younger brother Beau and Josh Schmidt, 21 and Mika Tran, 23. A fifth crew is yet to be announced, but the team are reviewing candidates. Could it be you?

Departing from Melbourne, the voyage will take in the Queensland Coast, the Kimberley in north Western Australia, the Spice Islands of Indonesia, Sri Lanka and India. They will journey across Africa through Kenya and then the Congo. From here The Journey of Kijana will continue onto the Amazon River and South America, Venezuela and the USA along the Carribean, the Galapagos Islands and Ecuador, from Chile to Easter Island, Pitcairn and Tahiti in French Polynesia, then Samoa and PNG in Micronesia.

Lionheart, the 34ft Sparkman and Stephens sloop on which Martin made his 328 day solo voyage in 1998/9 is now up for sale and interested parties can find out more about the boat at Martin's website. Frankly we feel that the boat should be purchased by one of the museums in Australia.