With a big heart and a lot of ticker two young adventurers kayaked 3300 km to be the first to cross the Tasman Sea from Australia to New Zealand. This was the longest two man kayak expedition ever undertaken. After sixty two days of paddling James Castrission 25, and Justin Jones 24, reached the New Zealand shores of Nagamotu Beach at 12.20 pm local time (10.20 am AEDT). As James and Justin approached the shore they were met by a fleet of Maori wakas (canoes) and dozens of local kayakers who had paddled out to greet them. Crowds of more than three thousand lined the shore and rounds of Waltzing Matilda were sung as two very proud families waited to give their boys a hug.

It was heroes welcome, and for James and Justin it was a dream come true.

This is something we have dreamt about, it's a goal that we have set ourselves and it wouldn't have been fair if we didn't give it a go.

On 13 November 2007 they set off in a custom-made kayak named Lot 41 which was laden with supplies, safety equipment and communication systems.
James and Justin likened their journey to the great Australian race horse Phar Lap who had to journey across the Tasman in a small boat after being sold to an Australian trainer.
Lot 41 was the auction number in which Phar Lap was sold.

"On his first five races he pretty much lost every one of them, but his trainer had faith in him the whole way. That's what this project has been about, a big heart, and just a mind set to keep on going."
Over the two months they faced powerful winds and tides which saw them paddle in circles and add more than 1000 km and three weeks onto their journey. Each week they would record a podcast for those eagerly following their expedition. On Day 46, the 29th of December at 8.30pm they told us of this frightening encounter.

"There have been two sharks circling us the last hour and a half. They are quite inquisitive and they are constantly bumping the hull and rubbing their skins up against us. We saw them just on dusk and we can work out that one of them is about 2.5 meters long and the other one is significantly larger than that. So it's over half the length of our kayak. We feel very safe inside her majesties womb right now and are confident in the hull structure; never the less having their mass circling the kayak right now is quite terrifying.

It's very sobering to think that four hours ago we played Scissors Paper Rock and the duty of the looser was to jump in the water and scrub the fur off Lot 41 as our speed had significantly slowed down again. Jonesy heroically found himself in the water scrubbing the hull for 45 mins... Now we have these two massive sharks circling around the kayak which has been a really sobering thought."

Physical degradation was something that both James and Justin had to face with cuts taking a long time to heal and leg muscles deteriorating due to months of inactivity. A wobbly but joyous James and Justin supported each other as they walked onto New Zealand land. They appeared to be in remarkable shape with huge smiles, lots of hugs, and even the thirst to knock down a beer. "Thank you so much guys, we're just going to go off to hospital now to get a check up, but we're so, so happy."

© 2011 ABC