After sailing the seas of Polynesia for 40 years, the traditional voyaging canoe Hōkūleʻa has left home waters and ventured into the Tasman Sea for the first time, continuing her Mālama Honua Worldwide Voyage. Preceding this historic moment was a year-long journey through French Polynesia, Samoa, American Samoa, Tonga, and New Zealand. Hōkūleʻa’s arrival in Australia...
Master navigator Nainoa Thompson has just been honored in Washington D.C. for “Excellence in Exploration” at the 2015 Peter Benchley Ocean Awards. He is one of a handful of indigenous navigators left on Earth that can find tiny islands in the open ocean without instruments, using wayfinding techniques passed down over a thousand years. Thompson, mentored for decades by...
The Hawaiian voyaging canoe Hōkūleʻa and her crew have departed New Zealand, on its way to leaving the Pacific Ocean for the first time in her 40-year history. The canoe’s master navigator, Bruce Blankenfeld, will use traditional Polynesian navigation techniques to sail to Australia. The crew of 14 are expected to arrive in Sydney in mid-May....
When Hōkūleʻa entered the water for the first time in Kualoa 40 years ago, it was the beginning of a sail plan that has spanned generations and taken us on a 150,000-nautical-mile journey to reconnect the Pacific Ocean family that shares a common history of voyaging and exploration. Here on our island home, Hōkūleʻa became...
By Captain and Pwo Navigator, Kālepa Baybayan Tucked away along a hillside in Porohara, South Island, New Zealand, is Onetahua Marae. Onetahua means the “Gathering Sands,” and is named for the spit of land that juts out into the Tasman Sea at the northwestern edge of South Island. Here sperm whales annually beach themselves, and the...
By Captain and Pwo Navigator, Kālepa Baybayan It’s 9 a.m. and most of the crew of Hōkūleʻa, our 62-foot, deep-sea Polynesian voyaging canoe on a multi-year journey around the world, is still asleep. It’s amazing how exhausting sea travel can be. The hours of standing watch break down your natural rhythm of work-sleep cycles. The past two...
The Worldwide Voyage has many faces. Evan Rapoport is a Product Manager at Google in Mountain View, California, who had the good fortune to accompany the Voyage. Taking advantage of luck—whether by faith, presence of mind, or a keen instinct—is a skill set, and Evan seeks to understand and master it. By Evan Rapoport Just ahead of...
By Nahaku Kalei As island people and Worldwide Voyage sailors, we have a close relationship with food from the sea. Along with being a healthy source of lean protein, fish caught on the Hōkūleʻa and Hikinalia canoes is one of the most low-impact food sources we can utilize because, unlike other foods which have been...
Polynesian Voyaging Society crew members recently explored the only true tropical reef in the U.S. National Marine Sanctuary System, diving into the thriving waters of Fagatele Bay. The dive marks the first time the Polynesian Voyaging Society is “taking their voyage underwater” to show what a healthy ocean can look like. They were just...
By Eric Co The navigator cannot act on what they know, but what they think they know. The navigator must envision beyond sight, understand beyond the senses. Amid the vastness of the ocean and the complete darkness your senses are heightened, as are your emotions. Out there you can only worry about what you can...
The Worldwide Voyage is connecting many peoples and places with its stunning use of traditional navigation. Marisa Hayase is helping follow the many stories that are unfolding, and here she shares a small entry written by Hōkūle‘a crew member Ana Yawaramai on what the arrival at Tahiti was like. The Polynesian Voyaging Society Hawaiian canoes Hōkūle‘a and Hikianalia are journeying around...
The Worldwide Voyage is about more than just traditional knowledge or sailing the Pacific in canoes. Through this voyage, many peoples are connected, and awareness for the Earth’s incredible oceans is brought into sharp focus. Ever since the maiden voyage of Hōkūle’a in 1976, the village of Tautira on the northeastern shore of Tahiti has been...