Hans J Marter

14 May, 2008

A LONE yachtsman sailed past Shetland yesterday (Tuesday) on his way home to become the first sailor to circumnavigate the globe via the Russian arctic.

Adrian Flanagan set off two and a half years ago from the Royal Southern Yacht Club, on the Hamble, in Hampshire.

After 30,000 miles on his yacht Barrabas, a French designed 40-foot Trireme constructed entirely of stainless steel, he is now only days away from rejoining his family on the south coast of England.

The 47 year old left Hamble on 28 October 2005 heading first for Antarctica and Cape Horn before passing into the Pacific.

His voyage included Hawaii and Nome, in Alaska, before passing through the Bering Strait and into the Russian northern sea route, the first yachtsman ever to be granted permission to sail this route single-handed.

After overwintering his yacht in Mehamn, in northern Norway, he set sail for his final leg of the journey on 1 May.

Sighting Unst on Monday afternoon, Mr Flanagan wrote in his blog that he had just heard a British weather forecast for the first time since departing UK shores.

He wrote: "This afternoon at 9 minutes and 13 seconds past two o'clock, the log clicked onto 30,000 miles.

"It read 30,041 when I sighted British land once more - an hour ago, in the pink tinged dusk I saw Unst, northernmost of the Shetland Islands some 20 miles west - my first sighting of UK territory from the deck since the Cornish coast faded behind me in the mist on a drizzly November morning in 2005."

He continued: "My plan is to make for Kinnaird Head then hug the east coast of England and when I've hugged it all I can, I will get off my boat and kiss the ground - that's the plan."

He is expected back home at some stage next week. His blog can be read at: www.agx.firetrench.com