A thousand people gathered at Auke Bay in Juneau on Saturday to welcome the Hōkūle‘a and her crew to Juneau. Now, the crew is preparing to embark on a four-year journey around the world.
People on the shore heard Pu Kani — the sounding of the conch — as the twin-hulled, wind-powered voyaging canoe approached. Formline-painted yaakws brought the crew to shore as dancers performed in cedar hats and Chilkat robes.
Áakʼw Ḵwáan leaders welcomed the canoe to their homelands. Elder Fran Houston said the four-year journey will be special — and good for the communities it touches.
“It means a whole lot, a whole lot to everybody,” she said. “The connection is powerful. Everything right now is powerful. And I’m just real happy and just tickled pink.”
The crew of the Hōkūle‘a and their Southeast navigators lined the beach, facing the Lingít elders who came to greet them. Houston led a song she learned from her grandmother to the visitors.
“It’s with love,” she said. “And I love singing it and I’m surprised that I sang both verses twice.”
The crew — some dressed in t-shirts and hats, others in leis and malo — returned the welcome with their own songs and chants.
The Hōkūle‘a was returning from a voyage to Yakutat and other Southeast communities. On Thursday, the crew will begin a more than 40,000-mile journey — called Moananuiākea — with a goal of learning about land stewardship and unity from Indigenous communities around the world.
The voyaging canoe first sailed in 1975, when members of the Polynesian Voyaging Society started relearning traditional navigation methods from masters who have since passed. This will be its fifteenth voyage.
Nainoa Thompson, president of the Polynesian Voyaging Society, spoke to the crowd about that history and about the Polynesian Voyaging Society’s relationship with Southeast Alaska Indigenous communities, who gifted the society two spruce trees in the 1990s to build another canoe.
Central Council of Tlingit and Haida Indian Tribes of Alaska President Chalyee Éesh Richard Peterson said these relationships are very important to Alaska Native people as well.
“It’s really us kind of reigniting old ties, building on old relationships that have gone back since time immemorial. Our people have circumnavigated the Pacific and the world, not just the Hawaiians, but Lingíts and Haidas as well,” he said. “And so we have these intergenerational relationships.”
Chris Blake is a part of the crew that traveled to Yakutat. Back home in O’ahu, he teaches traditional, non-instrument navigation and wayfinding.
“It was beautiful. It’s a 30-hour journey, being in the inland areas,” he said. “And then, when we got out to the ocean, it’s definitely a lot colder than we were used to. But the amount of things that we’re seeing and the unfamiliarity with it — a lot of elders and people who are much more familiar with the area were there to guide us.”
Blake said he was energized by the navigation and voyaging skills shared by Indigenous Hawaiians and Southeast Alaska Natives.
“It was great to see the abilities that we have, and how they parallel a lot of the experts who are familiar with these areas,” he said. “A lot of our similarities are able to help us and to drive us into the things that we have to do.”
Blake hopes to be chosen to continue to participate in the Moananuiākea voyage as it circles the earth.
The Hōkūle‘a will set off on its voyage around the world Thursday afternoon, and all are welcome to send them off. In the meantime, crewmembers will give tours of the voyaging canoe at Statter Harbor.
Thompson says the canoe gets stronger when people touch it.
The voyage sets off Thursday afternoon from Auke Bay and will air live on KTOO 360TV starting at 2 p.m.
Anyone is welcome to attend the send off from 2 p.m. to 6 p.m. Information about how to attend Thursday’s event can be found on Sealaska’s website.
Disclosure: KTOO was contracted by Sealaska to produced video coverage of the Hōkūle‘a arrival on Saturday and Thursday’s departure. This has no impact on news coverage of the event.
KTOO is our partner public media station in Juneau. Alaska Public Media collaborates with partners statewide to cover Alaska news.
