I have long been intrigued with the discovery of New Zealand. This photo is of a wonderful, authentic replica of ENDEAVOUR that was at the show- Captain Cook’s vessel in which he made the first of his three voyages into the Pacific. It put a chill up my spine to walk the decks of this ship. Lots of people think Cook “discovered” New Zealand, but he didn’t. That honour falls to Kupe, the fortunate Maori who departed Raiatea in the Society Islands (near Tahiti) in a double canoe and sailed it over 2000 miles into the unknown about 1000 years ago. His canoe planted the first human beings on New Zealand, and every time I travel there I go to the spot in Whitianga where legend holds that he first stepped ashore. Coincidentally Cook also put into the same beach, where he performed a “transit of Mercury” which enabled him to fix the longitude of New Zealand to an accuracy of less than ten miles, an amazing feat for the year 1769. I’m sure you know that the first European who sighted New Zealand was actually Abel Tasman, who encountered it in 1642 , named it after his homeland (Holland) and reported the fact of the island’s existence, and the fact that it was inhabited by huge humans who bludgeoned and ate four of his crewmembers
This entry was posted
on Sunday, March 10th, 2019 at 6:24 pm and is filed under Uncategorized.
You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.
You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.
