Rafts, boats, and ships.

Things that float (sans Titanic).

How about a balsa wood raft? How about sailing it across the Southern Pacific Ocean?

Is this the definition of insanity? Well not if you’re a Norwegian anthropologist and adventurer named Thor Heyerdahl.

Thor was a boss, a man with vision, a man who looked in the face of reason and “truth” and created his own truth. He will always be a visionary that is blessed to us once in a generation; if we’re lucky.

To prove that Polynesia could have been colonized from South America, in 1947, Heyerdahl and five others (including a parrot named Lorita), sailed a balsa wood raft over 4,000 miles across the Pacific. The raft was named the Kon-Tiki.

The expedition set off from Callao, Peru on April 28, 1947. The raft sailed for 101 days covering 4,300 miles. The journey ended as the craft smashed into a reef at Raroia on August 7, 1947.

The Kon-Tiki is now displayed at the Kon-Tiki Museum on the Bydoy Peninsula in Oslo, Norway. The Kon-Tiki is one of my top sketching targets on my summer trip to Norway.

I find it serendipitous that the best way to get a museum dedicated to an epic sea voyage is by ferry. Also on the Bydoy Peninsula are the Vikingskipshuset, the Norwegian Martine Museum, and the Fram Museum

I did a sketch of Thor, wearing the Tiki mask that is painted on Kon-Tiki’s sail. I sketched with a bamboo dip pen and I’m pleased with the rustic, and sometimes uncontrollable looking lines.