The world-famous Belgian has arrived in Britain with his equally famous dog for a five-month stay -- nearly 70 years after his first visit.

Tintin, the eternally youthful reporter who only was ever known to file one story in all his adventures, is celebrating his 75th birthday this year with a new exhibition at London's National Maritime Museum.

Tintin at Sea is a collection of original drawings by Belgian cartoonist Georges Remi -- more commonly known as Herge which was the francophone pronunciation of his reversed initial RG -- and some of the artefacts and models that inspired him.

"Herge had a lifelong fascination with the sea and was above all a stickler for detail," the museum's director Roy Clare told reporters at a preview of the exhibition which opens to the public on Wednesday and runs to September 5.

Tintin, with his trademark quiff and plus-four trousers, travelled all over the world on adventures that took him and his white terrier known as Snowy in English and Milou in French from Tibet to America and Iceland to Africa.

Books of his adventures have been translated into 60 languages and have sold 200 million copies since the comic strip character first saw the light of day in 1929.

Although the stories took Tintin and his irascible companion Captain Haddock as far as the moon, the sea is a recurring theme, in stories such as The Crab with the Golden Claws, Red Rackham's Treasure and the Secrets of the Unicorn.

Herge, who only travelled widely after the success of his creation, was a self-taught artist.

He stayed in Belgium through World War Two and was accused and cleared of collaboration immediately afterwards, although he suffered a period of being ostracised as a result.

He was also accused of racism in some of Tintin's earlier adventures.

The reporter only once travelled to Britain, in the story The Black Isle, published in 1938.

"Here you have four famous Belgians," Joren Vandeweyer, the country's cultural attache to Britain, told reporters. "Tintin, Snowy, Captain Haddock and of course Herge himself, back after 66 years."

(Agencies)