Talisker Bounty Boat: Bounty beckons the dauntless

By Cassandra Jardine 1200PM GMT nineteen March 2010

Previous of Images Next Calm prior to the storms Mike Perham Photo DAVID ROSE The 25ft Bounty Boat

Eighteen-year-old Mike Perham will shortly be finding what it is similar to not to eat anything solely the occasional ship"s biscuit for weeks on end. It worries him a little. "I"ve never left but food before," he says, knocking behind a potion of orange extract as piece of his (so far unsuccessful) plan to put on weight prior to he starts.

The slight 5ft 8in teen customarily weighs some-more than 10 stone. Currently he is a mill next standard since he lost weight when he had his supplementary material private last month. "I don"t have a lot of fat to spare. But they contend your go by shrinks and your physique adjusts," he says.

British teen Mike Perham aims for round-the-world sailing jot down Racing Diary Dont go nearby Captain Biddick with a vessel stick Commons blueprint mutiny on the SS Brown Britains Mike Perham has probability assembly with Minoru Saito Heres since Ben Ainslie floats my vessel

Starvation is an peculiar form of damage for an continuation diver to inflict on himself, but the teen from Potters Bar is in a singular position. Long prior to his 18th birthday this week he had already chalked up dual "youngest chairman to…" universe records. Aged 14, he sailed piece for one person opposite the Atlantic; dual and a half years after he capped that by sailing piece for one person around the world, this time but his apportion surveyor father, Peter, following in an additional boat.

After subduing what he calls "the sailor"s Everest", all serve sails could appear similar to rock climbing Box Hill. Settling down to finish his BTEC in competition at a college nearby his home in Hertfordshire could appear tame indeed, as could requesting for a university march in movie production. Perham, a estimable envoy for UK Youth and the Prince"s Trust, frequency drinks, so he has no instruct to retire to the beer hall and solace his contemporaries with old sea-dog tales. He wants an additional challenge. Happily, he has found it.

On Apr twenty-eight he will stick on Australian adventurer Don McIntyre (whom he met on his round-the-world voyage) in a bid to snippet the nautical footsteps of Captain William Bligh after he was turfed off the Bounty by mutineers in 1789. The organisation will be raising income for a engine neurone disease investigate hospital in Sheffield in the process. "In conditions of sailing it should be far simpler than my prior adventures, but in alternative ways it will be majority some-more difficult," says Perham with such unflustered professionalism that it comes as no warn when his mother, Heather, says that from an early age her son was "frighteningly determined".

Bligh, with eighteen consistent sailors, was put to sea off the Pacific island of Tofua, nearby Tonga, in a 27ft vessel with couple of reserve and no charts. His target was to reach the Dutch allotment in Timor. After 48 days and 4,000 miles he in the future did so, losing usually one hold up (to stoning by Tofua natives) on the way, nonetheless dual alternative organisation members died shortly after landing, enervated by deprivation.

The tour by the Fijian islands, opposite the Coral Sea and the Great Barrier Reef to the northern seashore of Australia, afterwards westwards to Timor, has been recreated before, but with complicated apparatus and supplies. Even so, the cameraman on that excursion described it as the misfortune experience he had ever had. Perham, McIntyre and their dual alternative organisation members will go by all that cameraman suffered, and majority more, since they are not permitting themselves anachronistic luxuries.

With the target of recreating Bligh"s experience as closely as possible, even complicated garments will be forbidden. The Talisker Bounty Boat a 19th-century whaler is a 25ft long, 7ft far-reaching open vessel with 4 oars and no gangling sail. If they mangle the mast, they will have to have an additional one; Perham shrugs as if that is no vital task.

Managing the vessel should infer easy compared to the earthy discomforts of the voyage. There is no cabin to suggest insurance from the object for that, they will have to rely on object hats. They will have roughly no food and usually dual litres of H2O each a day, even though they will be sweating copiously. To navigate they will make make use of of a sextant to decider the point of view of the sun. There will be a satnav on house to show their progress, but they will not make make use of of it or even a flame solely in a life-and-death emergency.

"It will be scorching," Perham says, "as it usually rains there 4 days in a month. I love sleet since it washes the salt off your skin and cools you down." The 4 of them will have to waylay whatever nap they can underneath a tarpaulin. "And I love my sleep," he says, sounding for once similar to any alternative teenager.

But the majority severe aspect of the excursion for a piece for one person soldier is expected to be the ruin of 3 alternative people in consistent vicinity but even an iPod for distraction. What if the 4 of them hungry, thirsty, sleep-deprived and burnt to a frail find themselves fighting? "We will usually discuss it ourselves that we chose to be here." Fine words, but the probability of a Mutiny on the Bounty cannot be ruled out.

You can follow the swell of the Talisker Bounty Boat at bountyboat.com To present to the Motor Neurone gift revisit justgiving.com/bountyboatadventure