Into the BlueCaptain James Cook's three epic journeys in the 18th century were the last great voyages of discovery. His ships sailed some 150,000 miles, from the Arctic to the Antarctic, from Tasmania to Oregon, from Easter Island to Siberia. Before Cook set off for the Pacific in 1768, one third of the globe remained blank. By the time of his violent death in Hawaii in 1779, there was little left to discover and the map of the world was substantially complete.