I read the book Kon-Tiki in high school. I enjoyed the book and adventure. Thor certainly proved it could have happened by drifting, prevailing winds, and currents. In fact many plants and animals populate islands that way. However, even though there was already lots of evidence of the expansion being east across the Pacific instead. Thor didn’t believe it and felt it was from the Americas. Proving something is possible isn’t the same thing as proving it happened that way. I still value the great story and adventure, but wrong theory. Here is a link to a Smithsonian Mag Story.
I don’t recall how old I was at my first reading, but do recall feeling the “thrill” of the adventure in that book.
Thanks for stirring an old memory. 
I remember reading that book as a kid too. I can still imagine what it might have felt like to be one of the crew, and after an extended time at sea, to pry a chunk of waterlogged balsa off the surface of one of the logs, toss it in the water, and watch it sink.
There you go Flotsam. Stirring up old people.
Thanks for posting that, Castoff. Especially like the statement that “traditional knowledge teaches us how to live right on this planet.”
Hmm… No, I don’t remember it. I’ll have to see about finding an e-book.
Probably wouldn’t make it today. He would be trapped in the plastic dump.
@grayhawk said:
Probably wouldn’t make it today. He would be trapped in the plastic dump.
He would be Down in the Dumps.
@Guideboatguy said:
I remember reading that book as a kid too. I can still imagine what it might have felt like to be one of the crew, and after an extended time at sea, to pry a chunk of waterlogged balsa off the surface of one of the logs, toss it in the water, and watch it sink.
:o
That’s what you call a Sinking Feeling!
He was an exceptional person. Also eventually succeeding in sailing a reed bundle boat from Morocco to Barbados in under 2 months.
https://www.kon-tiki.no/expeditions/ra-expeditions/
@Rookie said:
Thanks for posting that, Castoff. Especially like the statement that “traditional knowledge teaches us how to live right on this planet.”
He didn’t succeed until he recruited people from Lake Titicaca in South America to build a larger version of the reed boats they built at home. They had the long history of know how and understanding to effectively use reeds to make a sea worthy craft.
Yes, that was THE adventure story when I was a kid. And beyond what Heyerdahl himself did, I think he was perhaps inspirational for other more recent voyages … for example, I recall reading of a similar endeavor to reconstruct a viking longboat and take it across the North Atlantic to “prove” the capabilities of those craft for those voyages. Even Jon Turk’s “Wake of the Jomon” trip that was supposed to follow a possible colonization route from northern Japan to the Pacific northwest prior to a Bering strait crossing from Asia to N. America (Kennewick man) seems like it could have been inspired by Kon Tiki, though I don’t think anyone has any idea about what sort of craft might have been used by such ancient peoples.
Great adventures all but, as has been said, proving it can be done isn’t the same as proving it was done.
Remember the Kon-Tiki?
Remember also Ra?
Lashing teak and papyrus would tend to tire us,
but Thor’s hammer still. beats its grandpa.