THOR HEYERDAHL'S KON-TIKI EXPEDITION
UNSOLVED MYSTERIES:
SOLUTIONS WRITTEN IN THE SAND AT LOW TIDE
In spite of living in the age of information, there are many unsolved mysteries in the world yet.ย These are mysteries that may not ever be solved.ย Nonetheless, there have always been and will always be people unsettled with not knowing, asking questions, seeking answers, inventing theories, proposing possible solutions, and testing ideas.ย The question of human migration is one such mystery shrouded in many theories that do not all agree thereby leaving the definitive explanation as elusive as sailors plans written in the sand at low tide.
ย ย Luc & Viviane โ ย Fountaine Pajot 42โฒ The story of Thor Heyerdahl can be found in books, museums, and in movies.ย He was born in Norway in 1914 and grew into an inquisitive and adventurous archeologist, geologist, ethnographer.ย He is most known for proposing, testing, and potentially proving his theory of human migration from South America to Polynesia.ย He surmised that Polynesia was actually populated from the east by Indigenous South Americans who drifted aboard balsawood rafts across the ocean.ย He sought to prove his theory by building a balsawood raft, which he named Kon-Tiki, lashing it together with natural materials as it may have been, setting out to sea, and drifting to Polynesia.ย However, in the spring of 1947, Kon-Tiki, Thor, and her crew put out to sea in search of ocean current that runs west from South America to Polynesia.ย After 101 days alone at sea, Heyerdahl completed his so-called Kon-Tiki expedition, leaving the world in awe.ย Kon-Tiki and her crew crashed into the eastern side of the Raroai Atoll in the Tuamotus in French Polynesia.ย Thor met few scholars who supported this theory of Polynesian settlement stemming from South America then or even now.ย ย However, his drift theory has been looked to by some as a testament to oceans as conduits for cultural transmission.
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Set among a million shades of blue, a beautiful anchorage and a small monument to the Kon-Tiki expedition can be found on the inside of the Raroia Atoll in the Tuamotus.
WHEN THE HALYARD SKIES OFFSHORE...WHAT DO YOU DO?
WHEN THE HALYARD SKIES OFFSHORE...WHAT DO YOU DO?
On every passage there are sail changes and shifts that go smoothly or even better than expected...and then there are the surprises.ย Some surprises are more or less demanding than others.ย Our most recent surprise underway gave Captain Mike the opportunity to go up the mast in the middle of the ocean under clear blue skies over gentle 2 meter seas.
His thought was, "I'd rather see what it's like now under these conditions in case I have to consider going up the mast in anything else."ย ย
Here's what happened:
Last week, we sailed from the Marquesas to the Tuamotus.ย Conditions were excellent; we decided to go dead downwind and fly our Main and Jib wing and wing.ย We poled out the jib, adjusted our course, set the main, and put a preventer on it.ย The boat felt rock solid sliding down waves and sailing at 9-10 knots.
The wind slacked, we shook out the reef and sailed for maybe 5 more minutes before we heard a "floosh"ย sound and SURPRISE our mainsail lay a limp pile on the boom.
After minimal discussion, Mike went up the mast to retrieve the halyard.ย He used his ascenders on one of our spinnaker halyards and we backed it up with our second headsail halyard.ย At the second spreaders we swapped and he was raised the rest of the way on the headsail halyard and the spinnaker halyard was his backup.ย Now with all these halyards, where is the backup main halyard?ย THAT and a backup mizzen halyard are now on our list.ย Had we had a backup main halyard we could have waited to ascend the mast on anchor instead of underway.ย Hindsight is indeed 20:20!
Once down with the skied halyard, we found that the shackle had opened, the main twisted out, and bent the shackle arms open.ย We fixed that, reattached the halyard to the sail, raised the main.
Mike's Take-away:
"It was about what I expected.ย The hardest thing was staying on the mast.ย I would definitely not want to go up in anything more than that without more in place to make it easier...like maybe some mast steps or a better climbing set-up."
SVย WHIRLWIND Mike, Maurisa, Russell, & Josea -ย Alajuela 48
