Salute to Adventure – the Frank Worsley story, which opens at the Akaroa Museum on 9th August, tells one of the most amazing stories of survival of the 20^th century.  Worsley was a supreme mariner, an unforgettable character and an irrepressible adventurer.

As Ernest Shackleton’s skipper on the Endurance in 1914, Worsley’s navigational skills and personal bravery were responsible for saving the Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition from total disaster.  He navigated a small lifeboat 800 miles across the southern ocean, in freezing conditions and huge seas, with barely a sight of the sun, to reach help and eventual rescue.

Born in Akaroa, Banks Peninsula, in 1872, Worsley’s life both before and after the Antarctic episode was filled with adventure and risk.  He ‘learned the ropes’ as a cadet on the square-rigged clipper ships, sailing around Cape Horn from New Zealand to England.  During WWI his fearless conduct in sinking German submarines earned him a Distinguished Service Order. Treasure-hunting in the Pacific, writing, lecturing  and drawing filled his later years, but he was never far from the sea.

Salute to Adventure – a new, permanent exhibition at the Akaroa Museum - does justice to his remarkable life.  For everyone with an interest in tales of the Antarctic, adventure, adversity and heroism, this exhibition is a must-see.

Akaroa Museum is open every day, except Christmas day.  Phone 03-304-1013, or email akaroa.museum@ccc.govt.nz, for further details.