PORT ANGELES — Tommy Cook is 3,366 miles into a journey of a lifetime.
He’s come a long way, but he’s not even halfway there.
Cook, 63, of Port Angeles, is taking a break from his transcontinental solo journey from Two Harbors, Minn., through the fabled Northwest Passage.
He embarked April 6 aboard a lightweight Corsair F-31 sailboat called the Cap’n Lem.
Cook sailed the Great Lakes, down the St. Lawrence River and into the Atlantic Ocean.
Sometime last month, Cook realized he wasn’t going to make it through the Northwest Passage — the legendary mariner route north of the Canadian mainland — before it froze up.
‘Too far south’
“I was too far south,” said Cook, while aboard another boat he owns, the Avanti, at the Port Angeles marina.
“It was getting real apparent that I wasn’t going to make it this year,”
So Cook left the Cap’n Lem at Happy Valley-Goose Bay, which is deep inside an inlet of the province of Newfoundland and Labrador, and drove home.
The lifelong sailer intends to go back to northeast Canada in May and resume his ambitious journey in June.
If all goes well, he’ll make it to Nome, Alaska, next year and sail back to Port Angeles in 2011.
‘Greatest adventures’
He described the four-month voyage to Happy Valley-Goose Bay was “one of the greatest adventures of my life.”
That’s saying something.
Cook has been to the Arctic five times, the Antarctic four times and around the world once during his career in the Coast Guard and as a merchant mariner.
“It was exciting, it was scary — just about everything except lonely,” Cook said. “You wake up in a new place every day.”
Many of the people Cook met during his overnight stops in port towns were intrigued by his vision of adventure. He corresponded with people he met along the way through his blog, at www.arcticsolo sail.com.
History of passage
Early European explorers tried unsuccessfully to find the Northwest Passage. The shortcut between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans through the Canadian Arctic would have been the ideal shipping route to Asia.
Roald Amundsen of Norway made the first crossing in 1906 using a 47-ton seal hunting ship, but it took his crew three years to break through the ice.
Six vessels have made it through, or are about to make it through, the passage this year, Cook said.
None of them are sailing solo, however.
Cook first dreamed of sailing the Northwest Passage when he was working aboard the Coast Guard ice breaker Polar Sea in 1982.
Mentor honored
He named his boat for his friend and mentor of 44 years, Lemuel R. Brigman III, who died in 2006. Brigman introduced Cook to the ways of the ocean when Cook finished school.
Cook grew up landlocked in Oklahoma and Texas. Now, when he goes inland, he doesn’t stay for long.
“I’ve never been away from salt water all that long,” he said. “When I am, I’m not very comfortable.”
During his recent voyage, Cook relied heavily on technology, such as a global positioning system. He was careful to avoid busy traffic lanes, stopping at ports every night except one while navigating the Great Lakes.
Once he made it to the open ocean, Cook would sail through the night by taking 30-minute naps and waking up to check his instruments.
His advice for someone contemplating a big adventure like his: “Don’t wait.”
“If you’ve got a dream don’t wait for it,” Cook said. “Start making some plans. Bring it out of the realm of fantasy.”
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Reporter Rob Ollikainen can be reached at 360-417-3537 or at rob.ollikainen@peninsuladailynews.com.
