WORLD TOUR OF HOKULEA AND HIKIANALIA

Having just returned from My Ultimate Global Adventure (MUGA), it is only appropriate that I post on the four year plan of two Hawaiian canoes on their plan to circumnavigate the planet:  Malama Honua --Care for the Earth--Worldwide Voyage.  MUGA took me over 51 days, 35,354 miles to six countries.  Yes, my carbon footprints were embarrassing.  Hokulea (below, left) and Hikianalia (right, sorry, but I've chosen not to add marks between and above letters), after a series of tests, will sail 47,000 miles, stopping in 28 countries, returning in mid 2017.   I only went to large cities.  H/H will be powered by the winds and sun and spend time in 85 ports, mostly island harbors.  How safe will it be?  The Hokulea has already sailed 138,000 miles.

It was a third of a century ago in 1975 that the Polynesian Voyaging Society of Hawaii built a double-hulled canoe, Hokulea, of plywood, fiberglass and resin.  The craft is 61 feet 5 inches long  with twin masts and can hold a crew up to 16 for long journeys.  Steering is by a long paddle and her top speed is 7 miles/hour.  Navigation is purely by observing nature: the stars, currents and birds.  There was no one in Hawaii with this capability, so the Society convinced Mau Piailug, of Micronesia, who spoke very little English, to teach them.  Five others refused. The first voyage was to Tahiti and back

Hikianalia has electric motors powered by solar photovoltaics, is 72 feet long and was built in New Zealand last year.  The Okeanos Foundation for the Sea paid for the ship.   Hokulea (Arcturus--Star of Gladness) and Hikianalia (Spica) are sister stars that rise together.  Spica is an interesting celestial body:  blue, 250 light years away, the 15th brightest star and part of a binary system (two stars, which can't be differentiated except for slight luminosity shifts corresponding to their close orbits).  Arcturus is 37 light years away.

It was in 1992 that Pinky Thompson, his son, Nainoa, and NASA astronaut, Lacy Veach, classmate of Nainoa at Punahou, planted the seed for the Malama Honua.  Since then, both Lacy (1995) and Pinky (2001) died of cancer.  According to the articles by Gary Kubota of the Star Advertiser and Hawaii News Now:

1.  The effort will cost $30 million.

2.  100,000 students are expected to track the canoe's journey online.  Go to:

     http://hokulea.org/

3.  400 crewmembers are training to join the sail.

4.  For the next year, the Hokulea and Hikianalia will tool around the Hawaiian Islands, making 30 stops to honor the local communities and show gratitude.  First, Hilo for koa planting and other activities.

5.  Then in May of next year, they head for the South Pacific.

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