Kon-Tiki's Pacific route to be traced by Tangaroa raft

0 Comments | AFP, April, 2006

LIMA (AFP) — Fifty-nine years after legendary Norwegian explorer Thor Heyerdahl crossed the Pacific on the balsa raft Kon-Tiki, his grandson set sail on a new raft to recreate his forebear's bold voyage.

With Olav Heyerdahl and five others on board, the Tangaroa -- a sort of 2006 model of the Kon-Tiki -- set off under a foggy sky from the Peruvian port of Callao, on a journey to cross the Pacific and reach the atolls of Polynesia.

After 16 naval officers rowed the balsa-log vessel 200 meters (yards) off the shore, the 16-meter-by-eight-meter (52-foot-by-26-foot) Tangaroa was picked up by a tugboat, which pulled it eight kilometers (five miles) out to sea, where it could catch the ocean currents.

A massive square sail was lifted, and the vessel set off on its...