Top 10 Most Epic Sea Voyages Ever

Top 10 Most Epic Sea Voyages Ever

Welcome to WatchMojo, and today we’re counting down our picks for the Top 10 Most Epic Sea Voyages Ever.

For this list, we’ll be looking at the most impressive, dangerous, or otherwise historically noteworthy journeys taken across the high seas. Since we’re focusing on documented expeditions, we’ll be excluding the no less grand cruises of mariners whose names are lost to legend. Since these travelogues have inspired many a movie, consider this your spoiler alert.

Do any of these adventures stir your wandering heart? Share your travel bucket list or other opinions in the comments below.

#10: Leif Erikson’s Voyage to North America (1001)

This Viking came from a long line of famous explorers, including his father, Eric the Red - who founded the first settlement in Greenland. Not to be outdone, his son sailed further west, becoming the first European to lead an expedition to North America. One account claims he heard of the new land from a trader who was blown off course by a storm. Another version says Leif himself stumbled upon it. Either way, traversing the cold stormy waters of the North Atlantic without GPS or even a magnetic compass was quite the accomplishment. The medieval warrior’s new community didn’t stand the test of time, but he did manage to return home, ensuring his vanguard of Vikings would eventually get the credit they deserve.

#9: Captain Cook's First Voyage (1768-71)

Of all this captain’s claims to fame, his first journey is his most influential. Full of danger and deception, it almost reads like an adventure novel. The story starts with Cook racing from England to Tahiti to observe the 1769 transit of Venus. After that, secret orders instructed him to search the South Pacific for a hypothetical continent thought to balance out the landmass in the Northern Hemisphere. While they never found it, they did become only the second group of Europeans to ever explore New Zealand and Australia. The sailors almost sank on the Great Barrier Reef, and finally made it home nearly three years after setting sail. Cook wasn’t as lucky on his third trek, when he died while trying to kidnap the king of Hawaii.

#8: Thor Heyerdah’s Kon-Tiki Expedition (1947)

If anyone can claim to be a real-life Indiana Jones, it’s this Norwegian scholar. Not only did he fight Nazis during World War II, he also led one of the craziest odysseys of modern times. When others laughed at the thought that ancient mariners could cross the mighty Pacific, this scholar put his money where his mast was. In 1947, Heyerdahl, five other men and a parrot named Lorita set out from Peru aboard a balsa wood raft. Using the winds and currents, they chased the sunset over 4,340 miles of ocean. Though his hypothesis that South Americans colonized Polynesia was wrong, subsequent research proved that Pre-Colombian Polynesians had made the same journey, only in reverse. Heyerdahl’s legacy stands as a monument to courage and curiosity.

#7: Ernest Shackleton's Trip from Elephant Island to South Georgia (1916)

Sometimes life isn’t a journey, it’s a desperate struggle to not become a leopard seal’s lunch. Ernest Shackleton and his crew learned this when their ship “Endurance” got trapped in ice on route to Antarctica. After a frosty year, the floating glacier crushed the Endurance. Two harrowing months later, their island started breaking up, forcing the lot to make a treacherous crossing to the nearest barren rock. With no chance of rescue, a small crew set off on a lifeboat with a desperate mission. Somehow, they crossed 800 miles of the world’s roughest seas during a hurricane and 32 miles of snow-capped mountains before finally arriving at a whaling camp. Shackleton wasted no time in rescuing his compatriots, all of whom survived.

#6: Christopher Columbus' First Voyage to the New World (1492-93)

Few failures changed history like this seafarer’s first voyage. After sailing with no sign of land for weeks, his crew had run out of patience. Fortunately for Columbus, an island was spotted on October 12th. Over the next months, they bumped into Cuba, Haiti and Hispaniola. However, they never found Japan, their original destination, which was 6,000 miles or so further than old Columbo calculated. Before heading home, the Admiral plundered whatever gold, knickknacks, and people he could. Narrowly surviving a storm and capture by the Portuguese, he returned to Spain on March 15, 1493. Columbus’ travels inspired others, such as Giovanni Cabot, better known as John Cabot, who led England’s first transatlantic foray only a few years later.

#5: Francis Drake's Circumnavigation of the Globe (1577–80)

This sea dog’s expedition wasn’t the first to circumnavigate the globe, but at least Drake actually made it home in one piece. Not that all his men were so lucky. In fact, so many sailors died on the journey’s first leg that two ships had to be scuttled. After executing a mutineer, the little armada pushed through the treacherous Straits of Magellan. While only one vessel made it to the Pacific, Drake’s daring never cracked. He plundered his way up the New World’s West Coast, amassing a vast fortune worth hundreds of millions in today’s money. After a quick rest in California, Drake pushed on across the Pacific, around Africa and finally back home, where Queen Elizabeth promptly had him knighted.

#4: The First Voyage of Vasco da Gama (1497-99)

Bartolomeu Dias reached the southern tip of Africa in 1488 after battling storms, currents and a mutinous crew. Using what Dias learned, nine years later Vasco da Gama went even further, becoming the first European to sail to India. Along the way, he explored East Africa, bombarded a city and pirated a few trading ships. When the little fleet finally reached its destination, their modest gifts failed to impress the King of Calicut. Feeling insulted, De Gama decided to kidnap several locals before hightailing it out of Asia. Half his crew died during the return trip, but the adventurer himself survived, becoming a national hero in Portugal, though folks in India and Africa definitely begged to differ.

#3: Joshua Slocum’s Solo Voyage Around the World (1895–98)

In need of some alone time, this seafarer set out on an epic yet solitary venture in 1895. Over the next three years, he single handedly traversed 46,000 miles of the briny depths to become the first human to solo sail around the planet. Starting in Boston, he crossed the Atlantic after a quick jaunt to Canada. Dissuaded from a sunny Mediterranean cruise due to corsair activity, Slocum reversed course. He visited Brazil before passing through the Straight’s of Magellan, where a few shoeless pirates boarded his sloop. Finding the deck covered in nails and the captain armed to the teeth, the bandits beat a quick retreat. From there it was mostly smooth sailing across the Pacific, around Africa and finally back to Beantown.

#2: Ferdinand Magellan’s Circumnavigation of the Globe (1519-22)

In the wake of Columbus’ voyages, Spanish expeditions continued pushing further from home. In 1513, Ponce De Leon reconnoitered a peninsula he dubbed Florida, though contrary to myth, he probably never searched for the fountain of youth. Later that decade, Ferdinand Magellan outdid them all. Planning to reach Indonesia by heading west, he barely suppressed a mutiny before sailing around South America, the first European to do so. What was expected to be a quick jaunt across the Pacific turned into a near four-month long ordeal that saw over two dozen men die, likely due to scurvy. In the Philippines, the explorer’s forceful proselytizing got him shanked, though his surviving crew carried on, finally reaching home in 1522 - completing the first circumnavigation of the globe.

Before we unveil our top pick, here are a few honorable mentions.

Jacques Cousteau's Antarctic Expedition (1972-73)
The Legendary French Oceanographer Surveyed Antarctica's Frigid Coast

George Vancouver Maps Northwest North America (1791-95)
This British Captain Surveyed the Tempestuous Dark Waters of the Pacific Northwest.

James Cameron's Descent into the Mariana Trench (2012)
The Famous Director Takes a Deep Dive, Plunging 6.8 Miles Below the Ocean’s Surface.

Roz Savage Paddles the Pacific (2007-10)
This Tough-as-Nails Adventurer Quit a Job & Marriage to Row Her Boat Across the World’s Oceans

#1: Journey of the Survivors of the Essex (1820)

The tragedy of the Essex inspired Herman Melville to write “Moby Dick,” and the real story is even more terrifying than the novel.The ship sailed from Massachusetts to an offshore whaling ground in the remote South Pacific. While hunting the huge beasts thousands of miles from land, an enraged sperm whale estimated to be 85-feet long sunk the ship with history’s hardest headbutt. Now stranded on boats little bigger than surfboards, the 20-men foolishly headed for South America instead of the Marquesas Islands, fearing rumors of man-eating natives. In a cruel twist of fate, the survivors themselves resorted to cannibalism before being rescued. While far from a triumph, this nightmare still haunts sailors even 200 years later.