2018 Wooden Boat Festival

An isolated Polynesian community seeks to renew self-reliance and joy by joining the crew of their voyaging ancestor Lata, and reconnecting with family and partners on distant islands. They build a voyaging canoe and navigate using only ancient methods, materials, and designs. Their wise and funny “Story of Lata” guides them. Elders train youths to weave sails, work the weather, and wayfind using natural phenomena and ancestral signs. Crew members share their personal histories and motivations to become voyagers, and come to realize how they themselves are very like the characters in the Story of Lata. They invite outsiders to join the crew.
*In Part One the would-be voyagers introduce themselves, their remote community, and the fact that their seafaring heritage offers them an alternative to isolation and dependence. When their most accomplished navigator dies, they decide to join the crew of their culture hero, Lata, who was the first person to build and sail a voyaging canoe. Today’s crew uses ancient designs, materials and methods that have been forgotten elsewhere. Their elders lead them in planting gardens, making rope from plants, felling trees, adzing the hull, weaving and sewing sails, and lashing parts together. They follow the steps in the ancient story of Lata, and avoid some hilarious and tragic mistakes that Lata made. They face their fears and prepare to be tested in the open ocean.