impact on the waves. Mau, Nainoa’s
teacher, had dozens of names just to identify the different widths and
colours caused by the path of the sun as its light and shadow rose and moved
over water. All of these told him something about the day to come.
The stern of the Hokule’a is square, which allows the navigator readily to
orient to east and west at both sunset and break of day. There are eight
marks incised along the railings on both sides of the vessel, each paired to
a single point in the stern, giving bearings in two directions, fore and aft
— thirty-two bearings altogether, which correspond to the thirty-two
directional houses of the star compass. The navigator by day conceptually
divides the horizon ahead and behind, each into sixteen parts, taking as
cardinal points the rising and setting of the sun. Thus by day he or she
replicates the star compass of the night. The metaphor is that the Hokule’a never moves. It simply waits, the axis mundi of
the world, as the islands rise out of the sea to greet her.
Beyond sun and stars is the ocean itself. When
clouds or mist obliterate the horizon, the navigator must orient the vessel
by the feel of the water, distinguishing waves created by local weather
systems, for example, from the swells generated by pressure systems far
beyond the horizon. And these swells, in turn, must be differentiated from
the deep ocean currents that run through the Pacific, and which can be
followed with the same ease with which a terrestrial explorer would follow a
river to its mouth. Expert navigators like Mau, sitting alone in the
darkness of the hull of a canoe, can sense and distinguish as many as five
distinct swells moving through the vessel at any given time. Local wave
action is chaotic and disruptive. But the distant swells are consistent,
deep and resonant pulses that move across the ocean from one star house to
another, 180 degrees away, and thus can be used as yet another means of
orienting the vessel in time and space. Should the canoe shift course in the
middle of the night, the navigator will know, simply from the change of the
pitch and roll of the waves. Even more remarkable is the navigator’s ability
to pull islands out of the sea. The truly great navigators such as Mau can
identify the presence of distant atolls of islands beyond the visible
horizon simply by watching the reverberation of waves across the hull of the
canoe, knowing full well that every island group in the Pacific has its own
refractive pattern that can be read with the same ease with which a forensic
scientist would read a fingerprint.
All of this is extraordinary, each one of these
individual skills and intuitions a sign of a certain brilliance. But as we
isolate, deconstruct, even celebrate these specific intellectual and
observational gifts, we run the risk of missing the entire point, for the
genius of Polynesian navigation lies not in the particular but in the whole,
the manner in which all of these points of information come together in the
mind of the wayfinder. It is one thing, for example, to measure the speed of
the Hokule’a with a simple calculation: the time a bit of foam
or flotsam, or perhaps a mere bubble, takes to pass the known length
separating the crossbeams of the canoe. Three seconds and the speed will be
8.5 knots; fifteen seconds and the vessel slogs at a mere 1.5 knots.
But it is quite another to make such calculations
continually, day and night, while also taking the measure of stars breaking
the horizon, winds shifting both in speed and direction, swells moving
through the canoe, clouds and waves. The science and art of navigation is
holistic. The navigator must process an endless flow of data, intuitions and
insights derived from observation and the dynamic rhythms and interactions
of wind, waves, clouds, stars, sun, moon, the flight of birds, a bed of
kelp, the glow of phosphorescence on a shallow reef — in short, the
constantly changing world of weather and the
teacher, had dozens of names just to identify the different widths and
colours caused by the path of the sun as its light and shadow rose and moved
over water. All of these told him something about the day to come.
The stern of the Hokule’a is square, which allows the navigator readily to
orient to east and west at both sunset and break of day. There are eight
marks incised along the railings on both sides of the vessel, each paired to
a single point in the stern, giving bearings in two directions, fore and aft
— thirty-two bearings altogether, which correspond to the thirty-two
directional houses of the star compass. The navigator by day conceptually
divides the horizon ahead and behind, each into sixteen parts, taking as
cardinal points the rising and setting of the sun. Thus by day he or she
replicates the star compass of the night. The metaphor is that the Hokule’a never moves. It simply waits, the axis mundi of
the world, as the islands rise out of the sea to greet her.
Beyond sun and stars is the ocean itself. When
clouds or mist obliterate the horizon, the navigator must orient the vessel
by the feel of the water, distinguishing waves created by local weather
systems, for example, from the swells generated by pressure systems far
beyond the horizon. And these swells, in turn, must be differentiated from
the deep ocean currents that run through the Pacific, and which can be
followed with the same ease with which a terrestrial explorer would follow a
river to its mouth. Expert navigators like Mau, sitting alone in the
darkness of the hull of a canoe, can sense and distinguish as many as five
distinct swells moving through the vessel at any given time. Local wave
action is chaotic and disruptive. But the distant swells are consistent,
deep and resonant pulses that move across the ocean from one star house to
another, 180 degrees away, and thus can be used as yet another means of
orienting the vessel in time and space. Should the canoe shift course in the
middle of the night, the navigator will know, simply from the change of the
pitch and roll of the waves. Even more remarkable is the navigator’s ability
to pull islands out of the sea. The truly great navigators such as Mau can
identify the presence of distant atolls of islands beyond the visible
horizon simply by watching the reverberation of waves across the hull of the
canoe, knowing full well that every island group in the Pacific has its own
refractive pattern that can be read with the same ease with which a forensic
scientist would read a fingerprint.
All of this is extraordinary, each one of these
individual skills and intuitions a sign of a certain brilliance. But as we
isolate, deconstruct, even celebrate these specific intellectual and
observational gifts, we run the risk of missing the entire point, for the
genius of Polynesian navigation lies not in the particular but in the whole,
the manner in which all of these points of information come together in the
mind of the wayfinder. It is one thing, for example, to measure the speed of
the Hokule’a with a simple calculation: the time a bit of foam
or flotsam, or perhaps a mere bubble, takes to pass the known length
separating the crossbeams of the canoe. Three seconds and the speed will be
8.5 knots; fifteen seconds and the vessel slogs at a mere 1.5 knots.
But it is quite another to make such calculations
continually, day and night, while also taking the measure of stars breaking
the horizon, winds shifting both in speed and direction, swells moving
through the canoe, clouds and waves. The science and art of navigation is
holistic. The navigator must process an endless flow of data, intuitions and
insights derived from observation and the dynamic rhythms and interactions
of wind, waves, clouds, stars, sun, moon, the flight of birds, a bed of
kelp, the glow of phosphorescence on a shallow reef — in short, the
constantly changing world of weather and the
Similar Books
