Peter Marston, who played Captain Granville, is a scientist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and actually owned the Mimi at the time the series was made. The Mimi was sold in 1999.
Each episode consists of two 15 minute segments: A fictional "Adventure Story" of the Voyage of the Mimi in the first part of each episode, then an "Expedition Documentary" that reveals the science behind the story line, in the second part of the episode.