Catamaran Made of 12,500 Plastic Bottles Arrives in Sydney

A catamaran made out of 12,500 plastic bottles has arrived in Sydney after a four-month voyage from San Francisco. The crew has been drawing attention to the pollution of the world’s oceans and seas.

The Plastiki was skippered by the environmentalist David de Rothschild, a descendent of the well-known British banking family, euronews reports.

The crew of the Plastiki, a 60 feet catamaran, which weathered fierce storms during its 8,000 nautical miles at sea, left San Francisco on March 20, 2010.

Plastiki stopped at various South Pacific island nations including Kiribati and Samoa along the way. "This is the hardest part of the journey so far - getting it in," the Daily Express quoted expedition leader David de Rothschild as saying.

"It has been an extraordinary adventure," said Rothschild.

The 31-year-old said that the idea for the journey came to his mind after he read a United Nations report in 2006, which said that pollution - and particularly plastic waste - was seriously threatening the world's oceans, reports The Daily Express.

He decided to prove that rubbish can be effectively recycled was to use some of it to build a boat, Sify reports.