Today's Q&A from Hōkūle‘a

Does it feel great knowing that you found the island?
Yes, it feels incredible. Traveling to Palmyra was a challenge in that Polynesian navigation techniques are meant to find archipelagos, not small atolls. But, thankfully, this training voyage has been extremely successful.

With all the calculations you have to do, how do you keep track of where you're going?
We keep our plan simple. We plan a reference course from where we are leaving to where we are going. As we travel, we keep track of speed and time. This gives us the distance we have gone.  For example, 5 nautical miles or knots for 2 hours equals 10 knots. Heavenly bodies, wind and swells help indicate the direction we are traveling. We then compare the distance and direction we have traveled to our reference course. You may or may not want to keep notes on each segment, such as a day's or a night's travel.

With all of this said, it is an amazing feat for celestial navigators to keep all of this information in their heads as they travel thousands of miles. As PVS lead navigator Nainoa Thompson said, "you must remember where you've come from or you're lost." The memory and dead reckoning skills of the navigators is truly impressive.

Do you feel like all your hard work has paid off?
Absolutely. There were two main purposes for the voyage to Palmyra and both have been accomplished. The first was to train new crew members in the skills necessary for deep-ocean voyaging. These new crew members are needed for both the worldwide voyage and the continuation of Polynesian voyaging. Therefore, it's extremely important that young people step forward, learn and then take the reins as leaders as we work toward our goal of circumnavigating the Earth. On this trip to Palmyra, an incrdible group of young people did just that.

The second goal of the voyage was to learn from Palmyra itself. An amazing intact ecosystem, Palmyra has many lessons that need to be brought back to our daily lives. Again, this goal was accomplished. Crew members have been moved in amazing ways by what they encountered in Palmyra. And, more importantly, theyʻre taking their experiences out into their own communities. During the coming weeks, we will be posting many of these lessons and thoughts here on the website.

What did you guys do for St Patrick's Day, besides eat the traditional Irish food?
Sing and listen to Irish music. Put up a green clover on each side of the boat and raised a clover flag.

How does it feel to be so close to what you guys have been working for?
We are very happy with our training so far. We will be very happy to see home, family, and friends, but we still have lots of work to do.