Listen free for 30 days

Listen with offer

Offer ends May 1st, 2024 11:59PM GMT. Terms and conditions apply.
£7.99/month after 3 months. Renews automatically.
Pick 1 audiobook a month from our unmatched collection - including bestsellers and new releases.
Listen all you want to thousands of included audiobooks, Originals, celeb exclusives, and podcasts.
Access exclusive sales and deals.
£7.99/month after 30 days. Renews automatically. See here for eligibility.
Pick 1 audiobook a month from our unmatched collection - including bestsellers and new releases.
Listen all you want to thousands of included audiobooks, Originals, celeb exclusives, and podcasts.
Access exclusive sales and deals.
Cork Boat cover art

Cork Boat

By: John Pollack
Narrated by: John Pollack
Get this deal Try for £0.00

Pay £99p/month. After 3 months pay £7.99/month. Renews automatically. See terms for eligibility.

£7.99/month after 30 days. Renews automatically. See here for eligibility.

Buy Now for £12.99

Buy Now for £12.99

Pay using card ending in
By completing your purchase, you agree to Audible's Conditions of Use and authorise Audible to charge your designated card or any other card on file. Please see our Privacy Notice, Cookies Notice and Interest-based Ads Notice.

Listeners also enjoyed...

Seven at Sea cover art
Seraffyn's Oriental Adventure cover art
Everyone Said I Should Write a Book cover art
The Other Side of the Ice cover art
Bull Canyon cover art
A Speck in the Sea cover art
The Backward Ark cover art
A Lap Around Alaska: An AlCan Adventure cover art
Pushing Rubber Downhill cover art
The Men We Became cover art
The Pelee Project cover art
How an Average Man Lived an Adventurous Life cover art
Wood's Relic cover art
A Life on the Edge cover art
Michael Palin: Around the World in 80 Days cover art
Seraffyn's European Adventure cover art

Summary

In the late 1990s, John Pollack was working as a Washington speechwriter when, frustrated by the cynicism and hypocrisy on Capitol Hill, he quit his job to pursue a boyhood dream: to build a boat made entirely of wine corks and take it on an epic journey.

Cork Boat tells the story of Pollack's improbable quest. Overcoming one obstacle after another, he convinces skeptical bartenders to save their corks, corrals a brilliant but disorganized partner, and eventually cajoles more than one hundred volunteers who help build the boat until their fingers bleed. Ultimately, Pollack completes his vessel of 165,321 corks and sets sail on a fantastic voyage down the Douro River in Portugal, where the Cork Boat becomes a national sensation.

In recounting these adventures, Pollack skillfully meanders through fascinating arcana, from the cork wars to the history of rubber bands (some 15,000 of which help hold his boat together). He also offers an insider's look at the White House, where he was a Presidential speechwriter and enlisted navy stewards to save corks for the boat.

Written with unusual grace and disarming humor, Cork Boat is a buoyant tale of whimsy, adventure, and the power of imagination.

©2004 John Pollack (P)2004 Random House, Inc., Random House Audio, a division of Random House, Inc.

Critic reviews

"[John] Pollack offers an amusing tale, with entertaining anecdotes constantly bobbing to the surface." (Publishers Weekly)
"Pollack's absurd quest seems not merely charming but heroic." (The New Yorker)

More from the same

Author

What listeners say about Cork Boat

Average customer ratings

Reviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.