A celebration Saturday marked the anniversary of Hōkūleʻa's beginnings 50 years ago. Thousands of people came together, including many who were present at the first ever launch back in 1975.
Nainoa Thompson, a pwo navigator and the CEO of the Polynesian Voyaging Society, spoke with HPR's Cassie Ordonio about the principles that have guided the organization’s work over the last several decades, and how he views the next generation of voyagers.
Interview Highlights
On the new generation of voyagers
NAINOA THOMPSON: I view them as being essential. In fact, one of our ways that we actually measure whether we're still relevant and we're still of value and there's meaning in voyaging is whether young people come or not… 50 years ago, it was a lot easier to find the time to come down and just train and spend time with nature and sailing. It's harder now. The pressure on young people is immense. They're asked to do an awful lot in their lives. So my view of the young people is that the ones that we have, they're extraordinary, and I see it because they've somehow balanced their lives and find time to be a part of the totality of what it takes to sail deep. The young are vital, because if they don't come, that means you become irrelevant. That means your organization is going in the wrong direction. If they don't come, it means that there's something wrong with our connection to young people. And I say that why it's so crucial is because if young people don't come and they don't learn, we're going to forget again. I think it takes one generation, that the navigation is so complex and it's so difficult, it takes so many years to be ready to go deep sea, and navigate 2,500 miles to find a small island in the ocean. It's not easy, and that road to get there is a sacrifice, and it's a challenge. Hōkūleʻa is constantly challenging us to have to explore, to have to learn and then to share. If young people don't come, then what I'm afraid of the most is that our generation could be viewed as the last, and we'll do the same thing we did 200 years ago, when early European voyagers came... The older generation made a promise to our teachers. They were not going to let the sailing and the voyage and the navigation go extinct. If young people don't come, you don't have a choice.
On honoring teachers
THOMPSON: We look back at the first 50 years, and we thank primarily teachers. Without them, we couldn't voyage. Imagine, 50 years ago on March 8, they launched a voyaging canoe and nobody knew how to sail it, let alone navigate. So our ability to do things like sail around the world is because everything was learned. We learned everything. We didn't know anything. We started at ground zero, and everything was learned. Therefore, you have to honor those who taught you. It's about the power of the teacher and that's at the heart of voyaging... My humble belief is that the real purpose for the navigators is not just to go find islands. In fact, I would say the highest level of navigation is, in my opinion, and this comes from just conversation with my teacher, Mau Piailug from Micronesia, at the highest level of navigation is the teacher. So I knew when COVID came, we had a problem here, because I don't know if we can hold these young ones, because it was so restrictive, and it was a scary time, and it was a time when there was a lot of doubt, there's a lot of fear. My fear was we couldn't hold them, because there's so much to learn, and the experiences were so restrictive. But that's not what happened.
On adapting training to unforeseen challenges
THOMPSON: What we did, I think is really important to understand. We navigate by many, many values that were taught, safety and health, number one priority, number one priority, especially with the dark cloud of COVID. So we changed the training of the navigators in 2020, all the kind of specific things you'll do on the canoe to become a good sailor — that's important, but what became more important was teaching values... The difference was we trained to this issue of mālama, of caring for Hōkūleʻa and caring for each other. Yeah, we made rules. And there were different rules. It was like, if you're going to do your swimming test at night, which we do tests at night, in the dark, and you're in a partner, you leave your partner behind, we cut you. You never do that. And the training, even up to Papahānaumokuākea, we said that we don't care if you don't find the island. What we care about is you care for the canoe, and you care for each other. And it had a profound impact, I think, on these young ones, that those values became the guiding light.
On the success of the young crew on a 2022 voyage to Tahiti
THOMPSON: The question at that time in 2022 is, who navigates? Who is going to captain this voyage? Should it be us old goats? They're tired of looking at us. They're tired of listening to us. The decision for who's going to captain and navigate, it has to be a statement of advancement, and so what we did was we picked a crew of young people. Half were in their 20s, half never sailed long before. We trained to this on values and less on the mechanics and the specifics of sailing, that's easy. And then we chose the captain and the navigator would be the same person, and it would be a woman… And so I got strong pushback from the senior guys, because they said, yeah, it's the right thing to do, to give them the challenge, to give them the responsibility, but they're not ready — and I kind of knew that. But the question in my mind is, when are they gonna be ready? And the question is not so much, when are they gonna be ready — when are you gonna give them an opportunity to test themselves? Against the advice, I towed them out to Kumukahi on the Big Island, from Hilo, and let them go... I was watching them and they were precise, they were excellent. They were right on that line [the reference course], and they don't know it, you know, they have no information about where they are, in reference to the line, and they were just precision and fast. And then, you know, the interesting thing that impacted me about, you know, the storms inside of me, they were going so well in the beginning, I was so happy for them. But this actually happened to me. They were too good. They're now having record time and this is like the what, the 13th voyage? My first voyage, it took me 33 days to get to Tahiti. They were in record time. And then this kind of unconsciously, I started not to feel good about this anymore, because they're too good. And if they're too good, then what does that make me? That's the storm inside, right, fear and envy, and where's your role, if they're that good.
On the storm inside him, watching the young crew successfully arrive in Tahiti
THOMPSON: My father passed away on Christmas Day in 2001, but he's always my navigator... And he came to me, and he said to me, when you see these young people, you need to thank them, because they're better than you, and that's your job. You're never going to be able to walk away from this canoe until you know that the younger people are better than you... That's how you're going to stop extinction. And so I went in and I met with them. It was amazing, but it was just these storms inside of ourselves. You know, the big storms on the ocean, they're beautiful, they're powerful, and you can do it and handle it because you're taught to be first, humble, and then two, you pay respect to the storm. If you don't, they'll kill you, and you always pay attention to them. The storms on the sea are easy. For me, the storms inside are much harder. It's not like I'm transcending to become the teacher. I'm, frankly, descending to become the student, because of what I know I need to know. I need to understand that my dad is correct — your job is to make them better than you — which allowed me to thank them and allowed me to be so proud of them. It's my job.
This interview aired on The Conversation on March 10, 2025. The Conversation airs weekdays at 11 a.m. HPR's Hannah Kaʻiulani Coburn adapted this story for the web.
