Originally from Kinvara, Mick Brogan grew up watching hookers carry turf between his home village and Connemara.

In the late 1970s he took part enthusiastically in the revival of the hookers, buying a gleoiteog and teaching himself to sail, getting involved in the annual Cruinniú na mBád in Kinvara, which is celebrating its 30th anniversary this year.

From these modest beginnings, Mick never could have expected that he would be part of the first team to circumnavigate the Arctic, East to West.

Mick and the crew got the idea to attempt the feat after a 1992 trip from Galway to Iceland in the St Patrick, a wooden boat. On that trip he visited Spitsbergen in Greenland and Janmayen, the northernmost active volcano on earth, which is under an ice shield. For that trip he and the crew were awarded the Blue Water Medal of North America by the Cruising Club of America, which "rewards meritorious seamanship and adventure upon the sea displayed by amateur sailors of all nationalities that might otherwise go unrecognized."

Arctic sailing so enthralled him that when the opportunity arose to go again in 1999, he didn't hesitate.

"In 1999 we decided to do the NorthWest passage. We were the first Irish boat to do it – wooden boats were unsuitable."

The crew built the ice-strengthened, aluminium boat 'Northabout' in Mayo, which took 13 months, and headed for Greenland in June 2000.

"We thought it would probably take us two years to get through, but it just took one season. We went from Greenland around Northern Canada and down to Nome in Alaska, we were the 13th boat ever to achieve that. Roald Amundsen was first, and John Tranken lost 129 men and two boats attempting it in 1830," explains Mick.

"At the time it was the biggest achievement – we planned to bring the boat home to Ireland via the Panama Canal, but we decided we'd try to do the North East passage, via Russia and Siberia. Noone has ever done it East to West before.

"It took us two years to get Russian permission, because a lot of that area is under military control. We got permission in '04, so we picked up the boat in Alaska and headed for Russia."

Mick's brother Colm, who was living in Russia at the time, joined the boat as an interpreter of both Russia's language and its culture. "He knew his way around the system, so it was through him we got the visa… he knew when they were looking for bribes!"

Under the terms of their visa, the crew were not allowed to carry weapons, and had to buy a gun from an Inuit in Siberia, in case they were attacked by polar bears while stuck in ice.

Most of the crew brought musical instruments and books with them for the long hours stuck down below when the boat wasn't moving, and as it turned out, the musical instruments were a good idea.

One of Mick's best memories of the trip is landing in a tiny village in Greenland at approximately 3am one morning.