Australian Don McIntyre and a three-man crew just completed the 4,000-mile path of William Bligh's famed "Mutiny on the Bounty" sea voyage, and it was all for a good cause.

The professional adventurers launched their open-air boat, known as the Talisker Bounty Boat, from Sydney to coincide with the mutiny's 221st anniversary.

Probably the most storied sea-faring revolt, the event took place when ship's mate Fletcher Christian led a crew's uprising against Lieutenant William Bligh on the British HMS Bounty, somewhere near Tonga.

Bligh found himself adrift with too many men, too little food and no charts. The fact that he was able to successfully navigate to Timor is incredible. The idea of willingly doing it again, under similar conditions, is just nuts.

"When I got the idea for this expedition back in 1983, it excited me," Captain McIntyre told Asylum. "I thought about it for about 20 years. It was also important to remind people of Bligh, if they had never heard of him, as it was an epic voyage that shows what the human spirit can do when pushed!"

First, McIntyre recreated the boat: a 25-foot long, open wood vessel. Then he filled it, as Bligh would have, with an 18th-century pocket watch, a sextant (for navigation), some ship biscuits, nuts, raisins and water (not to mention two bottles of Talisker scotch and six bottles of lime cordial). No GPS, no satellite phone, no toilet paper.

"The toilet paper was no problem at all!" said McIntyre, though we find it hard to believe. "There were a few heated moments on-board but usually they revolved around food." No word on whether that involved hunger-induced visions of shipmates turning into giant hot dogs.

The high-seas adventure took the men to Tonga, where they searched for fresh fruit and more water, across the tip of Fiji (where Bligh was pursued by cannibals), along the Queensland coast and, finally, north from the Great Barrier Reef to Timor.

On the way, the ship was struck by gale-force winds and tipped over soon after launch. And Capt. McIntyre passed three kidney stones while on board!

"The worst day was actually after the kidney stone attacks," McIntrye confessed. "I felt very down and despondent, thinking, What is all this for? But I got over that very quickly." No doubt the Scotch helped.

Seven weeks after they set sail, the crew of the Talisker Bounty Boat landed in Kupang, West Timor, on the very beach at which Bligh arrived. The crew raised $250,000 for the Sheffield Institute Foundation for Motor Neurone Disease, which helps fight Parkinson's and Alzheimer's diseases.

We asked Capt. McIntrye how he celebrated the successful journey. "We each ate two hamburgers with fries, along with some very nice, cold orange juice," he said. "It was unbelievable."