Peter Frank completed paddling 4,847 miles around the Eastern United States up river, with a prevailing headwind, all while dressed like a pirate on October 20, 2026.
The Great Loop is a route through waterways including the Mississippi, Atlantic and Gulf Intracoastal Waterways, the Erie Canal and the Great Lakes, ultimately circumnavigating the eastern United States. Typically, The Great Loop is generally done by motorized boats; Frank tackled it in a canoe.
Following in the paddlestrokes of Verlen Kruger and his son, Frank paddled Great Loop clockwise or the “wrong way”, which includes heading south along the Atlantic and up, rather than down the Mississippi or Tennessee–Tombigbee Waterway. Kruger, Frank’s inspiration and a legendary canoeist and canoe-builder, is also behind the design of Frank’s unique decked canoe, a 1982 Sawyer Loon.
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Why Peter Frank’s pirate costume is more functional than meets the eye
While Frank’s route choice is enough to stand out on its own, it’s hard not see his choice of paddling clothing and pause. To the casual observer, Frank accomplished a nearly 5,000-mile canoe trip dressed like a pirate. According to Frank, what started out as a joke turned out to be more practical than he initially imagined.
“Clothes that you buy from the store feel like they were made for everybody, and that doesn’t really feel comfortable to wear,” explained Frank.
When researching how to make his own outdoor clothes, Frank found that he didn’t want to model his new wardrobe after clothes that he already found to be uncomfortable. Instead, he looked to the past – what exactly did people do before the modern era of trim spandex and Patagonia?
“I looked into literature about Blackbeard, for instance … What did they wear when they were sailing the oceans?” asked Frank. “What did they wear when they were out there in the elements, doing arduous labor day after day in environments that were very moist, full of water, and full of rain and weather out in the sun twenty-four seven?”
Frank landed on baggy and breathable designs with natural fibers.
“At first, it was just kind of like a joke. I just wanted to dress like a pirate and thought it’d be funny,” said Frank.
What began as a joke became serious as Frank discovered that the people undertaking long journeys 300 years ago dressed the way they did for a reason: every aspect of Frank’s pirate-inspired wardrobe is laced with practicality from his feet almost all the way to his head.
“I think the pirate hat is the only thing that doesn’t really have any practicality,” explained Frank.
Hurricanes, headwinds and alligators
Twenty-three-year-old Frank began his journey in July 2024 in Escanaba, Michigan, and has had anything but smooth sailing. Hardly a stranger to long trips, Frank spent summer of 2022 canoeing the Mississippi, bikepacked the Louisanna, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida, and circumnavigated Florida on the Florida water trail by canoe. In 2021, Frank rode a unicycle across the United States to raise funds for Beacon House, an organization who housed his family when Frank was recovering from a car accident at age 14 that shattered his spine.
Even with an impressive long-trip resume, Frank’s current endeavor is proving to be his most challenging trip yet.
“In 2024, we had 11 hurricanes and five of them were major, and four of those hurricanes I experienced,” explained Frank.
Unexpected delays ranged from inclement weather to detours, and even included a 19-mile portage of the entirety of Cumberland Island, Georgia, through the sand. Frank described paddling south along the Atlantic Intracoastal as essentially paddling against the river as the predominant flood tide flows north.
“It’s actually eight tenths of a mile per hour that I was dragging that canoe. I had blisters on my hand so deep that they were bleeding when I finished,” explained Frank about walking across Cumberland Island. “I quite literally walked and dragged my canoe 19 miles to the border of Florida just to get out of this predominant wind.”
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Peter Frank is grateful to be alive
With freezing temperatures, hurricanes and headwinds one might wonder why exactly Frank kept paddling.
“I came out here because I’m really grateful to be alive,” said Frank. “The reason why I chose to do it in such a way to circumnavigate the Eastern United States in the wrong boat, in the wrong direction was because I’m very grateful to be alive. I think that a lot of young people don’t really realize that until they’re older.”
Buy Peter Frank a chicken here, and follow his adventure on Facebook or Instagram.
Editor’s Note: This article was originally published May 16, 2025 and has been edited to reflect the conclusion of Frank’s journey.
This article was published in Issue 74 of Paddling Magazine. 
This article was first published in the 2025 issue of Paddling Business. 
