An 11-strong crew of mostly German explorers set out from New York on Wednesday on a reed boat bound for southern Spain in a historic bid to prove that Stone Age man made similar trans-Atlantic voyages.
”We want to rewrite history,” Dominique Goerlitz, a botanist and experimental archeologist leading the expedition, said shortly before the 10-ton Abora III cast off, leaving the modern Manhattan skyline behind.
”This boat is a time machine to demonstrate that our ancestors were not that primitive,” he added. ”Naturally we have some concerns. We are doing a completely new thing. But I’m not afraid. I’m pretty confident.”
The crew hope to reach Spain in six to nine weeks, stopping off at the Portuguese islands of the Azores on the way to resupply before tackling the hardest part of the trip to the final destination of Cadiz in southern Spain.
Goerlitz first became fascinated more than a decade ago with pre-historic cave drawings of reed boats, some of which dated back 15 000 years. ”If they were able to do this, why not we?” he said.
His mission is to prove the experts wrong by overturning current thinking that, thanks to the prevailing winds and currents, Stone Age man would have been capable of sailing towards America but not back again.
In 1970 Norwegian explorer Thor Heyerdahl proved one way was possible when he crossed the Atlantic to reach America in his boat, Ra II. He was pushed by the prevailing trade winds and the powerful Equatorial current.
But Goerlitz and his crew have a harder challenge, and will have to tack against the strong Atlantic winds on the northerly route.
”The chance that we reach the Azores is 100%. The trip from there to Spain will be more difficult because of winds and currents,” said biologist Mark Hobert, another of the crew.
Abora III, which was built by Bolivian Aymaran Indians on Lake Titicaca where Heyerdahl’s Kon-Tiki project was also born, measures no more than 12m long and is just 4m wide.
The twin-hulled vessel is fitted with an 11m high mast and a 60 square metre linen sail to catch the capricious winds. Fourteen keelboards will help navigate and steer the boat against the winds.
”The boat is lashed tightly together. It can’t break in half, and it can’t capsize,” Goerlitz said of the design, based on observations of cave drawings in Spain and France, and akin to the vessels built by the ancient Egyptians.
Although the vessel relies only on wind and ocean currents for propulsion, the crew are equipped with modern navigational technology, including a global positioning system and an emergency radio.
However, the expedition still faces considerable dangers.
”The biggest worry is the modern shipping traffic,” said logistics manager and business consultant Michael Gruenert. ”Today’s container ships are huge, and they just won’t see us on their radar.”
The project, which also includes an engineer, a carpenter and two students, has been five years in the making and cost about €750 000, much of which has come from the crew or been raised in loans.
”We want to provide the experts with our data, and say to them ‘that’s how it was’,” said Gruenert. ”Long before the Vikings and Columbus there was trans-Atlantic trade.” — AFP
