Fancy a holiday in a sea of junk? Environmentalists in the US are offering “eco-adventurers” the chance to do just that.

From May 1 next year, the Sea Dragon will sail for two months through sections of the North Pacific Ocean swirling with debris from the March 2011 tsunami that devastated Japan, organisers said.

“We’ll be riding the same currents that are transporting cigarette lighters, bottle caps, children’s toys and all manner of other plastic pollution generated by the tsunami,” said expedition leader Marcus Eriksen.

The unique voyage is organised by the 5 Gyres Institute and the Algalita Marine Research Institute, both California-based non-profit groups that research and raise public awareness of plastic marine pollution.

Nine places are available on the Sea Dragon, a 22-metre former long-distance racing yacht, with the voyage being made in two stages – the first costing $13,500 per person and the second priced at $15,500 per participant.

Participants must agree to lend a hand to sail the steel-hulled sloop and to help researchers take stock of how the debris swept from the Japanese coast by the killer tsunami is drifting across the Pacific.

The first leg of the trip will depart the Marshall Islands for a section of the North Pacific Gyre known as the ‘western garbage patch’, where little research has been carried out so far on plastic pollution.

Leg two will go due east from Japan to Hawaii through the gyre – a vortex of ocean currents where seaborne litter accumulates – to cross the so-called ‘Japan tsunami debris field’.