Waka Whereabouts

It was taught to us at school as a quaint native myth, but I’ve never doubted that the great Polynesian navigator, Kupe, sailed to Aotearoa / New Zealand many times and committed tracts of her convoluted coastline to memory.

Just because something isn’t written down, that doesn’t mean to say it isn’t true. People from oral cultures, without the luxury of pen and paper to record their data, develop very long memories. A Polynesian navigator might be 40 years old before he got to guide an ocean going waka on a voyage across the vast Pacific and he would have spent 35 years – or about five doctorates for a modern scholar – of intensive education to earn that ultimate responsibility.

On my own trips round the coast of Aotearoa, I often imagine great waka looming out of the dawn, their inverted triangles of woven sail catching the wind as they gingerly approached this foreign shore, crews agog at an amazing land of white headed mountains soaring skyward like wise old gods, towering forest and flightless birds as big as palm trees, all soundtracked by a clamour of birdcall.

Ancient Polynesian navigators knew that the North Island (Te Ika a Maui) was shaped like a fish and explained its piscine profile with the legendary demigod angler, Maui, who hauled it from the depths.

Naming these islands Aotearoa – the Land of the Long White Cloud – makes sense. Navigating through the Pacific Islands using a sextant and stars, modern sailors become accustomed to looking for the small puffs of white cloud which form over most islands.

Land heats more quickly in the tropical sun than the deep water around it. Warm air rising off the miniscule land (or coral) masses in this vast ocean, condenses as it cools with altitude and forms small puffy white clouds which serve as distant markers for  navigators to confirm their whereabouts.

Aotearoa is about 2200 km from the nearest landfall and the first indication that the land hungry eyes of an ocean navigator might perceive of its existence, is the long white band of cloud hovering over its bush clad hills.

Polynesian navigators carried their own sextant, nautical almanac and an intimate knowledge of a range of natural phenomena, wave shapes and bird migrations in their heads and used them time and again to locate their vessels in the mighty ocean that covers about 40% of the planet.

Captain James Cook reported that the double hulled ocean going ships, built by the Polynesians without the benefit of iron, were only marginally smaller than his own tubby colliers and sailed about two to three knots (3.7 – 5.6 km/h)) faster on all points of sail. That’s about 112 km/h every 24 hours.

Crewed by whole seagoing villages they sailed, settled, traded and fought on a regular basis all over the entire Pacific Ocean at a time when Europeans considered the eastern edge of the Atlantic to be the “known world.”

To a sailor, the design of their waka makes sense. The towering figureheads at the stern of the waka, similar to those used in Norse Viking ships, acted as a wind vane to keep the bows into the wind whilst riding out wild weather. The low wooded waka must have shipped a lot of water but they had plenty of hands to bail them out and the ornate handiwork on some of the remaining bailers are, perhaps, a testimony to their vital role in keeping the whole operation afloat.

I once sat on the bridge of a ship in the Marshall Islands port of Majuro and watched three young men, reaching backwards and forth at speed in a 6m long traditional outrigger sailing canoe. They got something wrong and, with a spectacular splash, crew, mast, sail, boat and outrigger all parted company and were left floating about in the lagoon, a kilometer or so from the nearest land.

I leapt into the ships big, inflatable rescue boat, started the 90 horsepower outboard motor and roared across to the scene of the calamity, intent on rescuing the hapless sailors.

The three crewmen were all lying back in the water laughing their heads off in exhiliration. They politely waved me away, swam around and reassembled their vessel and were back up to speed before I’d tied the rescue boat back to the ship.

They and their boat belonged.

Returning from a 10 year sailing trip to the European country which my colonial forebears called “home” in my own yacht, with a wife who’d never been to New Zealand, we approached Cook Strait on a black night with a plummeting barometer and a north westerly gale slashing the sea surface into ribands of foam.

We raised the low lighthouse on a rock off Cape Jackson and picked our way into Queen Charlotte Sound while I explained the historical importance of our destination; Ships Cove, where Captain Cook had based himself for both his expeditions to New Zealand.

Marlborough Sounds williwaws sent horizontal rain slashing out of the dark as we motored into Cook’s cove to anchor but, even in the wee hours, a galaxy of red and green navigation lights and white anchor lights stood out against the black bush backdrop.

We anchored in a quiet corner of the cove, had a cuppa and retired.

Daylight came early and I was woken by a rhythmic thumping. Crawling from the 

cabin, I slid the hatch back and noted that the wind had dropped and a thick, grey mist had closed round the cove.

Suddenly the high prow of a Polynesian waka pierced the fog, paddled by a team of warriors who thumped the gunwale with their paddles between each stroke. I yelled excitedly to Sarah who squeezed into the hatch aperture beside me as the waka was swallowed back by the mist.

Each of the waka crew wore a bright yellow rain coat and we learned later from the radio that the Picton waka had been turned back from a Cook Strait crossing by bad weather, but that didn’t matter.

For a minute, I was back in Kupe’s country.