"defying modern estimations of limited exploration by prehistoric man. The idea was inspired by Norwegian explorer Thor Heyerdahl, who sailed from South America to Polynesia on the Kon-Tiki balsa raft in 1947. A similar boat, the Abora III, was launched in 2007 for a transatlantic crossing. Due to damage from several storms, the expedition was abandoned away from the Azores. Abora (deity) Abora is the name of an ancestal solar deity of La Palma (Canary Islands) and a traditional god of the Guanches, and of two reed boats. Abora (Ibru) is the name of the supreme being of the religion"
"was able to cross the Pacific Ocean on the balsa raft from Peru to Polynesia. A French seafarer, Éric de Bisschop, committed himself in a project he had had for some years: he built a Polynesian raft in order to cross the eastern Pacific Ocean from Tahiti to Chile (contrary to Thor Heyerdahl's crossing); the ""Tahiti-Nui"" left Papeete with a crew of five on November 8, 1956. When near the Juan Fernández Islands (Chile) in May 1957, the raft was in a very poor state and they asked for a towing, but it was damaged during the operation and had"
"Kon-Tiki expedition The ""Kon-Tiki"" expedition was a 1947 journey by raft across the Pacific Ocean from South America to the Polynesian islands, led by Norwegian explorer and writer Thor Heyerdahl. The raft was named ""Kon-Tiki"" after the Inca sun god, Viracocha, for whom ""Kon-Tiki"" was said to be an old name. """" is also the name of Heyerdahl's book; the Academy Award-winning documentary film chronicling his adventures; and the 2012 dramatized feature film nominated for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film. Heyerdahl believed that people from South America could have settled Polynesia in pre-Columbian times. His aim in"
"have been utilized 1,500 years ago by the indigenous peoples of the region. Though he himself cannot swim or sail, he sets out on the treacherous 4,300 nautical mile–journey across the Pacific from Peru to Polynesia aboard the small raft, along with his crew of five men (and a macaw named Lorita). During the three months aboard the primitive vessel named after Inca god of sun and storm, Kon-Tiki, the crew's scientific reenactment of the legendary voyage from the coast of Peru to the Polynesian islands is met with setbacks in the form of storms, sharks, and other perils of"
"dockyard facilities provided by the Peruvian authorities, they constructed the raft out of balsa logs and other native materials in an indigenous style as recorded in illustrations by Spanish conquistadores. The trip began on April 28, 1947. Heyerdahl and five companions sailed the raft for 101 days over 6,900 km (4,300 miles) across the Pacific Ocean before smashing into a reef at Raroia in the Tuamotus on August 7, 1947. The crew made successful landfall and all returned safely. Thor Heyerdahl's book about his experience became a bestseller. It was published in Norwegian in 1948 as ""The Kon-Tiki Expedition: By"
"under the title ""Fatu Hiva"" (London: Allen & Unwin, 1974). The story of his time on Fatu Hiva and his side trip to Hivaoa and Mohotani is also related in ""Green Was the Earth on the Seventh Day "" (Random House, 1996). In 1947, Heyerdahl and five fellow adventurers sailed from Peru to the Tuamotu Islands, French Polynesia in a pae-pae raft that they had constructed from balsa wood and other native materials, christened the ""Kon-Tiki"". The ""Kon-Tiki"" expedition was inspired by old reports and drawings made by the Spanish Conquistadors of Inca rafts, and by native legends and archaeological"
"(Wine and Other Beverages)"" and Einar Wallquist’s medical book ""Våra sjukdomar (Our Diseases)."" In 1947, Norwegian ethnographer Thor Heyerdahl made and sailed a raft of balsa wood, called Kon-Tiki, from Peru to the Polynesian Islands. The purpose of the trip was to prove that the Polynesian inhabitants originated from America rather than Asia. In the academic world, most people thought Heyerdal a fanatic and questionable scientist. In 1948, Norsk Gyldendal published Heyerdahl’s story, which then was sent to Bonniers for consideration, Helms managed to persuade Kaj Bonnier to have it transferred to Forum. ""Expedition Kon-Tiki (The Kon-Tiki Expedition)"" was a"
"evidence suggesting contact between South America and Polynesia. The ""Kon-Tiki"" smashed into the reef at Raroia in the Tuamotus on August 7, 1947, after a 101-day, 4,300-nautical-mile (5,000-mile or 8,000 km) journey across the Pacific Ocean. Heyerdahl had nearly drowned at least twice in childhood and did not take easily to water; he said later that there were times in each of his raft voyages when he feared for his life. ""Kon-Tiki"" demonstrated that it was possible for a primitive raft to sail the Pacific with relative ease and safety, especially to the west (with the trade winds). The raft"
"on the balsa raft from Peru to Polynesia. Kantuta Expeditions The Kantuta Expeditions were two separate expeditions on balsa rafts led by the Czech explorer and adventurer Eduard Ingris. The voyages were inspired by the Thor Heyerdahl's Kon-Tiki expeditions. The goal of the expeditions was to repeat the success of the Kon-Tiki and confirm Heyerdahl's thoughts about the migration of Peruvian people to Polynesia. The first expedition, Kantuta I, took place in 1955/1956 and led to failure. In 1959 Ingris built a new balsa raft Kantuta II and tried to repeat the previous expedition. The second expedition was a success."
"days at sea due to difficult weather conditions. By then, the rafts had sailed halfway to South America. All crew members were taken aboard a Japanese freighter, and later transported to shore by the Chilean Armada. Expedition leader Torgeir Higraff chose to terminate the expedition to avoid risking the life of crew members. The expedition built and sailed two balsawood rafts: ""Rahiti Tane"" and ""Tupac Yupanqui"". The rafts were similar to the ""Kon-Tiki"" raft built by Thor Heyerdahl in 1947. Like the ""Kon-Tiki"", ""Rahiti Tane"" and ""Tupac Yupanqui"" were built from balsawood transported from Ecuador to SIMA, the Peruvian Army's"
"inter-island trade in the South Pacific. On their voyage to the Pacific she developed problems at sea, forcing the crew to return to New York City. On December 2, 1947, the boat caught fire of undetermined origin while docked at the Boat Basin in Flushing, New York. The schooner was repaired and sold to Louisa Mendes of Egypt, Massachusetts. She entered the packet trade in a trans-Atlantic crossing to Cape Verde with a cargo of food and clothing. Upon reaching the islands, Captain Henrique Mendes reregistered the schooner under the name ""Ernestina"", after his own daughter, and used her in"
"of a fleet of ""Empress"" ships, but somehow ""Empress of Japan"" stood out, in part because she held the speed record for crossing the Pacific for over two decades. Captained by Captain Henry Pybus, ""Empress of Japan"" won blue ribbon for record crossing of the Trans-Pacific crossing of 1897. The proud ship remained in active trans-Pacific service until 1922; and then she lingered, harbor-bound in Vancouver for several years. The dragon figurehead has been preserved at the Seawall in Stanley Park ""Empress of Japan"" was refitted as an Armed merchantman during the Great War; and consequently, she lost the elegant"
"went to French Polynesia where he became a merchant seaman for 4 years. In 1951 his trade failed and he got an administrative job as geometer in the Austral Islands (Rurutu and Raivavae). In 1956, he committed himself in a new ""odyssey"", a project he had had for some years: he built a Polynesian raft in order to cross the eastern Pacific Ocean from Tahiti to Chile (contrary to Thor Heyerdahl's crossing); the ""Tahiti-Nui"" left Papeete with a crew of five on November 8, 1956. He had recruited two experienced sailors from Tahiti for this challenge: Michel and Alain Brun."
"was afloat at least until 1948. Star of Peru The Star of Peru, originally the Himalaya and eventually the Bouganville, was an iron sided sailing vessel. When she was purchased by the Alaska Packing Co., the name changed to ""Star of Peru"" and she was overhauled for use in Alaska. She was later sold to French owners and became the ""Bouganville"". The ship is now a wreck site. The ""Himalaya"" was built in 1863 by Pile, Hay & Co. in Sunderland, England. She measured 201'2""×33'0""×20'4"" and had a tonnage 1008 GRT. She was sold to Shaw, Savill & Co. around"
". In September 1909, ""Mauretania"" captured the Blue Riband for the fastest westbound crossing — a record that was to stand for more than two decades. In December 1911, as in New York City in December 1910, ""Mauretania"" broke loose from her moorings while in the River Mersey and sustained damage that caused the cancellation of her special speedy Christmas voyage to New York. In a quick change of events Cunard rescheduled ""Mauretania""s voyage for ""Lusitania"", which had just returned from New York, under the command of Captain James Charles. ""Lusitania"" completed Christmas crossings for ""Mauretania"", carrying revellers back to"
"that ancient mariners knew the Pacific currents and winds as well as modern humans know road maps. It was hoped to double the distance achieved by the Kon-Tiki expedition, the 1947 raft crossing by Thor Heyerdahl from South America to the Polynesian islands. Like the Kon-Tiki expedition, the aim was to see if a raft made from the materials available in the 16th century in pre-Columbian South America, when such vessels had been observed by Spanish sailors, could navigate the journey. Having been surprised by the seaworthiness of La Balsa, being confident they could have gone on to reach Africa"
"is) widely accepted, but from South America. In 1947, Heyerdahl successfully sailed the balsa-wood raft ""Kon-Tiki"" from Peru to the Tuamotu Islands in an effort to prove it could be done. The subsequent Rapa Nui expedition was meant to be less of an adventurous experiment and more of a true scientific expedition. Figueroa was a twenty-four-year-old graduate student in archaeology at the University of Chile and working at Santiago's natural history museum when he joined Heyerdahl's expedition as the official representative of Chile and liaison officer, or, as Edwin Ferndon referred to him, ""a 'watchdog' representative."" He was also to"
"5th and 6th generations of the Chevrolet Corvette had floor pans composed of balsa sandwiched between sheets of carbon fiber reinforced plastic. Norwegian scientist and adventurer Thor Heyerdahl, convinced that early contact between the peoples of South America and Polynesia was possible, built the raft ""Kon Tiki"" from balsa logs, and upon it he and his crew sailed the Pacific Ocean from Peru to the Polynesian Tuamotu Archipelago in 1947. However, the Kon Tiki logs were not seasoned and owed much of their (rather slight) buoyancy to the fact that their sap was of lower density than seawater. This serendipitously"
"40th year anniversary celebration has occurred at the museum in November 2013. It saw some members of the crew reunited for the first time since the voyage. Vital Alsar Pacific raft expeditions Between 1966 and 1973, Spanish explorer Vital Alsar led three expeditions to cross the Pacific Ocean by raft - La Pacífica in 1966, La Balsa in 1970 and Las Balsas in 1973. Travelling from Ecuador, South America, to Australia, the first expedition failed, but the second and third succeeded, both setting the record for the longest known raft voyages in history - and respectively. The aim of the"
"voyaged as far as Mexico and introduced metallurgy to the civilizations of that country. Some scholars and adventurers of the 20th and 21st century have asserted that the rafts and their crews journeyed thousands of miles across the Pacific to Polynesia, most notably Thor Heyerdahl who reached Polynesia on the Kon-Tiki raft. Several other people and groups have also built rafts based on prehistoric models and undertaken trans-Pacific voyages. Balsa is the Spanish word for raft. The use of rafts for commerce on the coasts of Peru and Ecuador, from northern Chile to southern Colombia, continued until the late 19th"
"was safely beached on Mangareva. In the story, London has the ship sail past Mangareva and all through the Tuamotus before beaching on Fakarava. The Tuamotus made headlines around the world in 1947, when Norwegian ethnographer Thor Heyerdahl, sailing from South America with a crew of five others, reached Raroia on his raft ""Kon-Tiki"". More recently the islands have been the subject of headlines as the site of French nuclear weapons testing on the atolls of Moruroa and Fangataufa. The Tuamotu archipelago consists of eight groups of small islands and atolls: Related island groups include: Tuamotus The Tuamotus, also referred"
"of the seafaring Austronesians vessels. It is considered by scholars to have been the most likely type of vessel used for their voyages and exploration across Southeast Asia, Oceania, and the Indian Ocean. In the late 20th century, Philip Beale, a British sailor, became interested in depictions of the ship at Borobudur and decided to reconstruct one. Aided by government and international bodies, he organized an expedition team that constructed the ship and, from 2003 to 2004, sailed it from Indonesia to Madagascar and to Ghana, proving that long-distance trade had occurred. The Samudra Raksa Museum was constructed at Borobudur"
"Nuestra Señora de la Concepción Nuestra Señora de la Concepción (Spanish: ""Our Lady of the (Immaculate) Conception"") was a 120-ton Spanish galleon that sailed the Peru–Panama trading route during the 16th century. This ship has earned a place in maritime history not only by virtue of being Sir Francis Drake's most famous prize, but also because of her colourful nickname, Cacafuego (""fireshitter""). At the helm of his ship ""Golden Hind"", Sir Francis Drake had slipped into the Pacific Ocean via the strait of Magellan in 1578 without the knowledge of the Spanish authorities in South America. Privateers and pirates were"
"Hōkūleʻa Hōkūlea is a performance-accurate ""waa kaulua"", a Polynesian double-hulled voyaging canoe. Launched on 8 March 1975 by the Polynesian Voyaging Society, she is best known for her 1976 Hawaii to Tahiti voyage completed with exclusively Polynesian navigation techniques The primary goal of the voyage was to explore the anthropological theory of the Asiatic origin of native Oceanic people (Oceania maps: , ), of Polynesians and Hawaiians in particular, as the result of purposeful trips through the Pacific, as opposed to passive drifting on currents, or sailing from the Americas. (DNA analysis illuminates this theory.) A secondary project goal was"
"Francisco. Rather than risk flying back to Honolulu and being shot down by Japanese fighters, it was directed to fly west to New York. Starting on December 8, 1941 at Auckland, New Zealand, the ""Pacific Clipper"" covered over 31,500 miles (50,694 km) via such exotic locales as Surabaya, Karachi, Bahrain, Khartoum and Leopoldville. The ""Pacific Clipper"" landed at Pan American's LaGuardia Field seaplane base at 7:12 on the morning of January 6, 1942, completing the first commercial plane flight to circumnavigate the world. The ""Clipper"" fleet was pressed into military service during World War II, and the flying boats were"
"Carlos Caravedo crossed the Pacific Ocean in 1965 in 115 days in a raft named ""Tangaroa"", of which 18 days were used by the crew to cross Tuamotus, the Tuamotu Archipielago, making ""Tangaroa"" the only raft that has managed to cross that dangerous archipelago of French Polynesia by its own means. On November 18, 1965, the ""Tangaroa"" ended its journey on the Fakarava island. Fakarava is where the ""Tangaroa"" is currently preserved. The 1973 Las Balsas expedition was the first (and so far only) multiple-raft crossing of the Pacific Ocean in recent history. It is the longest-known raft voyage in"
"the island and carved the numerous stone monoliths (or Moai) still remains one of antiquity's greatest mysteries and has baffled the scientific community for centuries. Inspired by world-famous explorer Thor Heyerdahl before his death, Buck's plan was to support the theory that ancient South American voyagers crossed vast ocean expanses in various types of boats including the ancient style reed raft that were quite possibly the key factor of human migration and the spread of civilization. The expedition set sail from Arica, Chile and completed the voyage to Easter Island, Polynesia in 44 days in 2000. It was the first"
"shot down Pope's aircraft and captured him, after which the USA rapidly aborted the CIA mission and reversed its policy towards Indonesia. SS Flying Lark SS ""Flying Lark"" was a ship built in Fredrikstad, Norway in 1915 as the banana boat ""SS Honduras"". Over a 43 year career that spanned oceans and seas the world over she had 10 owners, eight names and a succession of different managers. She is best known today as the ""Flying Lark"", given to her by her final owners in 1957. That is the name she bore in the Moluccas in eastern Indonesia in April"
"The crew once used a hand-cranked emergency transmitter to send out an ""all well, all well"" message ""just in time to head off a massive rescue attempt"". The call sign LI2B was used by Heyerdahl again in 1969–70, when he built a papyrus reed raft and sailed from Morocco to Barbados in an attempt to show a possible link between the civilization of ancient Egypt and the New World. ""Kon-Tiki"" left Callao, Peru, on the afternoon of April 28, 1947. To avoid coastal traffic it was initially towed out by the Fleet Tug ""Guardian Rios"" of the Peruvian Navy, then"
"Arung Samudera The Arung Samudera, which means ""Ocean Crossings"", is an Indonesian tall ship. The sailing vessel is a class B schooner which measures 129 feet in length. Notable features include arched windows on the aft deckhouse, 3 single piece masts, and a boxy hull. Originally built to be used as a New Zealand Sail training vessel in 1991, the ship was commissioned to be used as the first training vessel of the Indonesian navy at the Arung Samudera Conference of island nations in 1995. On August 23, 2007, the ""Arung Samudera"" ran aground off the Sunshine Coast of Queensland,"
"Pacific Clipper The Pacific Clipper (civil registration NC-18609(A)) was a Boeing 314 Clipper flying boat famous for having completed Pan American World Airways' first around the world flight in December 1941-January 1942; it was also the first commercial plane flight to circumnavigate the world. The ""Pacific Clipper"" was at first given the name of another older Boeing 314, the ""California Clipper"" while the original ""California Clipper"" (NC18602) was being moved to Pan Am's Atlantic service. On December 2, 1941, the ""Pacific Clipper"" departed from the Pan Am base on Treasure Island, San Francisco for its scheduled passenger service to Auckland,"
"Thor Heyerdahl Thor Heyerdahl (; October 6, 1914 – April 18, 2002) was a Norwegian adventurer and ethnographer with a background in zoology, botany, and geography. He became notable for his ""Kon-Tiki"" expedition in 1947, in which he sailed 8,000 km (5,000 mi) across the Pacific Ocean in a hand-built raft from South America to the Tuamotu Islands. The expedition was designed to demonstrate that ancient people could have made long sea voyages, creating contacts between separate cultures. This was linked to a diffusionist model of cultural development. Heyerdahl subsequently made other voyages designed to demonstrate the possibility of contact"
"States Navy assumed control of the Clippers in 1942. ""Honolulu Clipper"" flew between California and Hawaii and to Australia via Canton Island, Fiji, Nouméa and New Zealand after Japan gained control of the pre-war Pan Am facilities at Wake Island, Guam and Manila Bay. Pan Am crews maintained a unique line-crossing ceremony flying to New Zealand and Australia. Passengers crossing the equator for the first time provided a banknote to be endorsed by those who had made the passage before. The endorsed banknote, known as a short snorter, was returned to the initiate as a credential for future crossings. ""Honolulu"