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I glided silently over the swells in foggy Monterey Bay in a Polynesian voyaging canoe that relies solely on the wind and sun for power, and is manned by a crew that navigates by the stars. The Cook Islanders guiding the canoe, known as a vaka moana, are one of seven crews of the Pacific Voyagers, a group that has sailed over 15,000 miles across the Pacific to reconnect with the ocean and spread awareness about its threatened state it in a project inspired by Okeanos founder Dieter Paulmann. The voyagers’ arrival in Monterey brought attention to their mission, and reconnected them with their partners at the Center for Ocean Solutions whom they met many nautical miles ago at June’s Kava Bowl Ocean Summit in Hilo, Hawaii.
The Pacific Voyagers project was inspired by Paulmann after
he learned of the extensive threats to the oceans. Searching for a powerful means to spread awareness, he settled
on making a film that chronicles the long journey made by Polynesian Master-Navigators sailing their vakas from the
South Pacific to Hawaii and then San Francisco and Los Angeles with only the
stars to guide them. Construction
of the first vaka began in Aotearoa, and crews were formed throughout the
Pacific as more island nations heard of the project. Seven vaka crews were filled, with sailors from the Cook
Islands, Fiji, Samoa, Aotearoa, and other island nations, all ready to take on
the risk and test of endurance needed to travel vast distances across the
Pacific.
While sailing on the vaka, I had the chance to speak with Tua Pittman, one of the Cook Island vaka Te Marumaru Atua crew and spokesperson for the Pacific Voyagers, and ask if the Kava Summit introduced any threats to the ocean that he didn’t know of previously. Answered Tua, “We were kind of aware of them, but you don’t have access to such expertise (as at the Kava Summit). When you’re put in a group of so many people who know a lot about the ocean and the different aspects of coral life and the reefs, it just changes the whole perspective of our understanding of the environment we live in, day in and day out. It is huge for us.”
Part of the mission of the Pacific Voyagers project is to spread
awareness about the emerging threats to the ocean. Overfishing, rising sea levels, fossil fuel contamination, and
plastic debris are widely-known and well-publicized problems. Their blatancy was apparent to the
voyagers while sailing across the Pacific, as they came upon bulky heaps of
flotsam, and a fin whale wrapped in a bright orange plastic rope that cut
deeply into its neck. More subtle
dangers, hypoxia, ocean acidification, and noise pollution, are less
well-known, which the voyagers hope to change.
The quiet threats hit close to home for the Cook Islanders. Their lagoons suffer from coastal runoff, worsened by reduced wetlands and septic leakage. The nutrient inputs cause algae to bloom and cover coral reefs. Composed of fifteen small islands with a total land area of only 92.7 square miles, the Cook Islands’ Exclusive Economic Zone covers an enormous 690,000 square miles of ocean. The fairly small population of less than 20,000 people has an obvious connection with the sea, and they have not escaped the problems that arise from human impact on the ocean. “I think we’re the one that feels the punch,” said Peia Patai, Captain of the Te Marumaru Atua. “Because we are small,” he said, “we see the difference bigger than you guys do.”
The voyagers departed Auckland, New Zealand in April 2010 and sailed for Hilo, Hawaii, where they attended the Kava Bowl Ocean Summit. The Kava Summit was a conference, sponsored by Okeanos, with the goal of bringing together people of varying backgrounds and expertise to freely exchange thoughts and ideas, in an effort to contribute and learn of the threats affecting the Pacific Ocean. The Center for Ocean Solutions was a supporter and participant in the Kava Summit, where Executive Director Meg Caldwell, Management Committee member Dr. Stephen Palumbi, and Associated Researcher Dr. Barbara Block were in attendance.
COS’ partnering institutions, Stanford University (though
the Woods Institute for the Environment and Hopkins Marine Station), the
Monterey Bay Aquarium, and the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute all do
extensive work in the Pacific Ocean due to its proximity. As COS’ mission is to find practical
and enduring solutions to the greatest challenges facing the oceans, and does a great deal of work in the Pacific, it was important for COS to play an integral
role in the conference by providing the expertise of its staff and researchers,
while also learning from the experience of others in attendance.
At the Summit, strong ties were formed between the voyagers and COS, and COS offered a welcoming reception for the voyagers during their stay in Monterey. I jumped at the chance to attend and spend more time in the company of such inspiring people. I was not the only one who had looked forward to the event. World-renowned oceanographer Sylvia Earle, who had also taken a ride on a vaka earlier in the day, was at the reception, as was Dieter Paulmann.
The diverse and important group was welcomed by Meg Caldwell,
and heard an inspiring speech by Dieter Paulmann. Tua Pittman spoke on behalf of the voyagers, and his words
resonated with the hope that the oceans can be saved, with
each of us working toward the solution. Later in the evening as the night wound down, I had the chance to talk more with Tua
about his experience with the project.
I asked if he hoped to attend future Kava Summits. He answered,
“Yes. Yes. Yes. It was an experience for us… I did share at the last Kava ceremony: I said, with what we do and the know-how and power and knowledge that were there, there has to be a way that we can make a change… I think we’ll start to see that we can save this planet.”
