17-year-old Pete Dana runs a boat yard in Hidden Harbor with his father. It's a quiet New England town -- until Jeffrey Fannin arrives. Fannin is reckless and plans to sell a line of red speed boats called Sea Sharks. When Pete makes this mistake of tying up his own boat at what should have been a public dock, it mysteriously comes loose and is almost lost, he suspects Fannin is to blame. And what is Fannin up to at the old factory? Something smells fishy to Pete...and it isn't the ocean! ...

In August 1979, 303 yachts began the 600-mile Fastnet Race from the Isle of Wight off the southwest coast of England to Fastnet Rock off the Irish coast and back.It began in fine weather, then suddenly became a terrifying ordeal. A Force 10, sixty-knot storm swept across the North Atlantic with a speed that confounded forecasters, slamming into the fleet with epic fury. For twenty hours, 2,500 men and women were smashed by forty-foot breaking waves, while rescue helicopters and lif...

A level 1 Oxford Bookworms Library graded reader. Written for Learners of English by Tim Vicary. In the summer of 1910, a race began. A race to be the first man at the South Pole, in Antarctica. Robert Falcon Scott, an Englishman, left London in his ship, the Terra Nova, and began the long journey south. Five days later, another ship also began to travel south. And on this ship was Roald Amundsen, a Norwegian. But Antarctica is the coldest place on earth, and it is a long, hard journey ove...

Winner of the National Outdoor Book AwardFrom the Pulitzer Prize-winning historian, a "suspenseful" ( WSJ) and "adrenaline-fueled" ( Outside) entwined narrative of the most adventurous year of all time, when three expeditions simultaneously raced to the top, bottom, and heights of the world.As 1909 dawned, the greatest jewels of exploration—set at the world's frozen extremes—lay unclaimed: the North and S...

“HEAVEN HELP THE SAILOR ON A NIGHT LIKE THIS.”–old folk prayerIn late December 1951, laden with passengers and nearly forty metric tons of cargo, the freighter S.S. Flying Enterprise steamed westward from Europe toward America. A few days into the voyage, she hit the eye of a ferocious storm. Force 12 winds tossed men about like playthings and turned drops of freezing Atlantic foam into icy missiles. When, in the space of twenty-eight hours, the ship was slammed by two rogue...

"A riveting adventure": the true story of a 1913 Arctic expedition that ended in disaster—and the captain's daring journey to save his surviving crew ( Booklist ).In 1913, the former whaling ship Karluk set out in search of an undiscovered continent, with the largest scientific staff ever sent into the Arctic. Soon after, as winter took hold, they were blown off course by polar storms. When the ship became impriso...

National Outdoor Book Awards WinnerThe true, harrowing story of the ill-fated 1913 Canadian Arctic Expedition and the two men who came to define it.In the summer of 1913, the wooden-hulled brigantine Karluk departed Canada for the Arctic Ocean. At the helm was Captain Bob Bartlett, considered the world’s greatest living ice navigator. The expedition’s visionary leader was a flamboyant impresario named Vilhjalmur Stefansson hungry f...

Tom Crean ran away from his Kerry home, aged 15, to join the British navy in 1893. He travelled to the Antarctic with the famous explorers, Scott and Shackleton. He explored the unknown, crossed ice fields and wild oceans and courageously saved friends from death.

*Another such wave could easily be the end of us. I had to do something, fix something, save the boat, save myself.But what?*Gary Paulsen takes readers along on his maiden voyage, proving that ignorance can be bliss. Also really stupid and incredibly dangerous. He tells of boats that have owned him—good, bad, and beloved—and how they got him through terrifying storms that he survived by sheer luck. His spare prose conjures up shark surprises and killer waves as well as moon...

Explorer Robert E. Peary's quest for the North Pole—a true Arctic adventure from the #1 New York Times –bestselling author of A Night to Remember ."A master narrator." —Arthur Schlesinger, Jr.On March 1, 1909, only 413 miles of formidable ice separated Robert E. Peary from realizing his lifelong dream of becoming the first man to set foot on the North Po...

Following in the Yachting Monthly paperback series (Confessions, Further Confessions, etc) this book is based on a popular run of articles over the last eight years in Yachting Monthly, in which navigational and seamanship problems are posed and the highly respected author (former RYA Training Manager Bill Anderson) gives his opinion on the best way to resolve them. And if there are several options, he airs them all.The question and answer format...

CHAPTER 1. Loomings.Call me Ishmael. Some years ago—never mind how long precisely—having little or no money in my purse, and nothing particular to interest me on shore, I thought I would sail about a little and see the watery part of the world. It is a way I have of driving off the spleen and regulating the circulation. Whenever I find myself growing grim about the mouth; whenever it is a damp, drizzly November in my soul; whenever I find myself involuntari...