When I was a kid (it must've been middle school) one of our teachers brought us down to the library and spread out on all the tables were books that hadn't been checked out in years. We had to pick one and do a report on it, I chose "
Kon Tiki" by
Thor Heyerdahl. The book was a memoir about Heyerdahl proving his theory that South Americans could have traveled to Polynesia on a boat made out of reeds
by actually making a boat out of reeds and sailing across the freakin' Pacific.
Now, this book didn't spark my interest in maritime culture/history (and, oddly we had a lot of that for a Midwestern school) but I do remember being fascinated and empathetically terrified for poor Thor as he crossed the Pacific in his boat of reeds...
...anyways, today Kim Carver of
Jack Tar Magazine posted a video of some chipper bastard waking up Thor's grandson Olav for his watch on a boat called
The Plastiki! Apparently, a new group of stalwart sailors has made a boat out of recylcable plastic and is going on something called the "
The Plastiki Pacific Voyage" through the Great Garbage Patch of the Pacific to Oz and back to San Francisco. Think they're trying to make a point?
Wow. Good on ya, mates! Seems like a helluva project. I'm glad they don't have any swag for sale because I'd hate to break my Wife's injunction against the purchase of new t-shirts....
(The above cartoon is taken from an image of Thor on the cover of his book "Fatu-Hiva". I have no idea what he's wearing on his head. Behind him is the Kon-Tiki at dockside.)
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