Why did the narrator undertake the Voyage ?

The narrator had dreamed of sailing around the world in the wake of the famous explorer, Captain James Cook and for the past 16 years he had spent the family's leisure time honing their seafaring skills in British waters. Their boat, Wavewalker, a 23 metre, 30 ton wooden-hulled beauty, had been professionally built and he had spent months fitting it out and testing it in the roughest weather that they could find.