In Darwin’s Wake: Retracing HMS Beagle’s Route 200 Years On
29th July 2025
The abiding image of Charles Darwin is of the naturalist in his later years, bearded and with a face etched by time, sitting in his garden at Down House in Kent. But he was a youthful 22-year-old when he embarked on what would be one of the most consequential expeditions in human history: his five-year journey onboard HMS Beagle, beginning in 1831, which gave rise to the theory of evolution by natural selection.
Two centuries on, a magnificent Dutch three-masted topsail schooner — the Oosterschelde — has docked in the shadow of Tower Bridge after a two-year conservation expedition retracing Darwin’s steps, having stopped at big ports where the Beagle made landfall. But whereas Darwin’s voyage forced humanity to reconsider its past, this project looks to the future.
The Darwin200 initiative was spearheaded by the British naturalist and geographer Stewart McPherson, 43, who sought to harness the naturalist’s legacy to inspire and train a new generation of scientific thinkers.