Proa Sailing: March 2012

March 08, 2012

Our Blue Canoe - voyaging canoe

"Our Blue Canoe" article at Proafile:
http://proafile.com/magazine/article/our-blue-canoe

And the "trailer" at YouTube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UR_nk7ZEKcE&feature=player_embedded#!

From Proafile's article: "The film is part of a larger initiative called the “Vaka Motu” project, by Pacific Voyagers. The vision is to connect all Pacific Islands in a sustainable, carbon-neutral fashion via Vaka Motu, thus gaining independence, better infrastructure, and more economic opportunities for remote island communities."

Pacific Voyagers site here:

http://www.pacificvoyagers.org/

Contemporary proas

Some contemporary proas. The top two pics are Jzerro. The bottom two are from "Grillabongquixotic":
http://grillabongquixotic.wordpress.com/2011/07/02/a-report-on-my-version-of-gary-dierking%C2%B4s-t2-pacific-flying-proa/

March 02, 2012

The Navigators - Pathfinders of the Pacific

"Site, text, and images Copyright © 2002 Sam Low. All rights reserved. Any or all content may not be used without Sam's permission" - My apologies to Sam for using this but I don't thing he'd mind!

Sam Low's Screening Room - a page about the making of his benchmark film The Navigators - Pathfinders of the Pacific:
http://www.samlow.com/screeningroom/navigators-clippings.html

"The Navigators - Pathfinders of the Pacific" - was first shown nationally in prime time on PBS in 1983 and later broadcast internationally in Europe and South America. It was awarded a Cine Golden Eagle, a Blue Ribbon at the American Film Festival and a Silver Anvil and has been screened at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology film series, Film/Video International at Castle Hill, Honolulu Film Festival, Margaret Mead Film Festival, Nantes Festival International de film du Mer, among other venues."

Filming the interview with Mau

A navigation lesson in Mau's canoe house

Filming a wedding on Satawal

Mau's canoe at sea off Satawal

A link here to The New Film Company who sells the film:

http://www.newfilmco.com/navpage.htm

About "Proa Sailing"

"The traditional Micronesian outrigger voyaging canoe is a marvel of technological design and evolution which can hardly be improved upon. This site explores concepts for adapting the native rig for single and short-handing. Development is ongoing..."

That's how this site began - to document my attempt to adapt or modify the traditional Micronesian proa sailing rig for the single or short-handed crew.

But now we're evolving...

To what? To be determined... Ode to Proa? All Things Proa? Who knows - let's just have fun with this...

The new byline is Sustainable Seafaring from Oceania. History, Design, and Relevance.

Hopefully I have given credit where credit is due. For all the photos, articles, and thoughts which I've borrowed - thank you to all the authors and photographers out there!

Note: All of the old Star-Rigging research and development postings can be accessed by clicking on the "Star-Rigging" label in the "Labels" cloud below.

The follow-up research, which has been quite rewarding, has its own Page named A Working Crabclaw Sail.

Why tinker with a good thing?

The Micronesian Proa rig is already an exceeding good thing. Why even mess with it? Because single-handing the rig during the shunt can become a daunting prospect as boat size, wind strength, and/or sea state increase.

My traditionally rigged 16 footer was blissfully simple - it didn't even have backstays - only a single shroud. But on a breezy day and on choppy water that rig had a mind of its own when shunting. Dropping down into a trough just as I approached the new bow with the sail was a trip. The whole rig had mass and momentum and went overboard a few times.

As a single-hander I sought a way to get the rig shunted in a controlled fashion - something I could rely on in a breeze and in a larger boat.

Resources (under construction)

Brower, Kenneth, A Song for Satawal, Andre Deutsch, 1983

Finney, Ben R., Hokule'a: The Way to Tahiti, Dodd, Mead, & Company, 1979

Gladwin, Thomas, East Is a Big Bird, Navigation & Logic on Puluwat Atoll, Harvard University Press, 1970

Haddon, A.C. & Hornell, James, Canoes of Oceania, Bishop Museum Press, Combined into one volume and reprinted 1975

Lewis, David, We, the Navigators, University of Hawaii Press, 1972

Schacht, Michael, Proa File, Since 1999: a comprehensive and invaluable website: http://proafile.com/multihull-boats/

Sperry, Armstrong, Call it Courage, The MacMillan Company, 1940

Thomas, Stephen D., The Last Navigator, Ballantine Books, 1987

Tribute to Mau

The great illustration above (I don't know the true title, I'm just calling it Tribute to Mau) is by Ahukini Romero Kupihea. See his page here: http://www.kupiheahawaiianart.com/about

From a his YouTube video:
"Traditional Hawaiian Artist Richard Kupihea Romero. Is a talented craftsmen skilled in Hawaiian Sculpture with wood and bronze, an artist that can draw in pen and ink. Oil painting and Hawaiian history, education helping and sharing his wisdom with others. Here his fascination with canoes shows. Kupihea appears courtesy of Hawaii News Now. Mahalo and Malama Pono. You can visit Kupihea on the web at. http://www.kupiheahawaiianart.com

Video URL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NQzED455eAE