When the Beetle was a very small Beetle one of the first
books about travel she read was by Thor Heyerdahl, the world-renowned
explorer and archaeologist. He must have fired the imaginations of millions
with his exploits, trying to recreate the journeys of people from past
times.
He was born in 1914, in Larvik, Norway and from his earliest
days, he was an enthusiastic nature lover, and became a voracious explorer.
His first expedition was to Polynesia in 1937-1938 when he was studying
the origins of the island's life, that he became convinced that human
settlers had come with the ocean currents from the west just as the flora
and fauna had done. In 1947 he decided to build a replica of the aboriginal
balsa raft (named the “Kon-Tiki”) to test his theories. In 1947,
Heyerdahl and five companions left Callio, Peru and crossed 8000 km (4300
miles) in 101 days to reach Polynesia (Raroia atoll, Tuamotu Archipelago).
Thor Heyerdahl managed to demonstrate that the ancient Peruvians could
have reached Polynesia in this way.
Following the success of the Kon-Tiki Expedition, in
1952, Heyerdahl organized and led the Norwegian Archaeological Expedition
to the Galapagos Islands, where it was demonstrated that once again, the
people of South America had the means to travel much further than archaeologists
had previously believed. In 1949, he continued his research on ancient
navigation and turned his attention to the ancient reed-boats made of
papyrus. These boats were deemed insufficient to cross the Atlantic as
the reeds were believed to become water-logged after less than two weeks
on open water.
Heyerdahl believed that contemporary science underestimated
the ancient vessels and undertook to prove this by experiment. In 1969,
he bought 12 tons of papyrus and worked with experts to construct an ancient-style
vessel. The result was a 15 m boat which was launched at the old Phoenician
port of Safi, Morocco. In the spirit of cooperation, Heyerdahl embarked
under the UN flag with a crew of seven men from seven countries. The papyrus
craft, Ra, sailed 5000 km (2700 nautical miles) in 56 days until storms
and deficiencies in the construction caused the team to abandon their
target only one week short of Barbados.
Thor Heyerdahl died in June of this year, aged 88.
