IT IS great news that the replica of Captain Cook's Endeavour is returning to Whitby next summer. But how sad that the vessel, making its second tour of Britain, will again not be putting into the Tees.

It is possibly a myth about Capt Cook that he gained his love of the sea at Staithes, after leaving the "farming" country of Cleveland. Though Capt Cook's birthplace cottage has long been demolished, its site, on the gently-rising slopes of Stewart Park, Marton, near the edge of Middlesbrough, is still open enough to enjoy an almost intimate view of the Tees estuary. As a boy, Cook would see it, less than three miles away, across unbroken fields.

Cook's family didn't move "over the hill" to Great Ayton until he was eight, quite long enough for the spectacle of ships passing up and down the coast, and to and from Yarm, then the port of the Tees, to make a strong impression on him. Describing the view in 1808, the Cleveland historian John Graves observed that "the sea, generally crowded with ships, presents an interesting object".

Teesside people are immensely proud of their Capt Cook link. In the two latest tributes, a new Middlesbrough square and the main regional hospital for south Teesside have both been named after the world-changing navigator.

On Endeavour's last visit to Britain, her Australian operators were taken aback by the scale of the welcome in Whitby. Elsewhere, Endeavour didn't always have anything like the same impact. But if Endeavour had visited the Tees, the interest in her would have been in the same league as Whitby's. Certainly every school in the region would have visited the ship. And since the vessel needs to earn her keep, ignoring the Tees was a golden opportunity squandered.

Now, just as sad as the repeated omission of the Tees, is the apparent lack of any civic effort to bring her to the port. In Cook's day, collier brigs like Endeavour were the most numerous trading vessels on the North Sea. Endeavour entering the Tees would replicate the first sight of ships that Cook ever had.

Perhaps the calculation is that Teessiders will visit the ship at Whitby. But there are many on Teesside for whom the cost of travel, added to the admission, will be prohibitive. Of the ship's planned six-week stay in Whitby, surely a fortnight could be allocated to Teesside? After all, while Whitby's own replica Endeavour, a one-third scale version destined to make tourist trips from the harbour, is only now on the stocks, Middlesbrough has long had a model in its shopping centre, and Stockton boasts an all-steel replica in the river - both pre-dating Australia's Endeavour.

Such devotion to one of the outstanding figures - and ships - in history deserves better than to be snubbed - twice.

OPEN for business - the countryside? How long is it since Tony Blair gave that assurance. On a road from Helmsley, on the North York Moors, the other day, I came across a notice requesting people to go no further unless their journey was necessary. And in Wensleydale the following day, I discovered a chaotic jigsaw of some footpaths open and some closed - often almost adjacent in the same village. It's now nine months since foot and mouth struck.

Published: 28/11/2001