White House officials greet Hokule‘a crew

The Hawaiian voyaging canoe Hokule‘a has arrived in Washington, D.C. — the start of a pivotal few weeks along the East Coast in which its crews aim to boost national awareness of its “Malama Honua” (“Care for the Earth”) global journey.

Accompanied by a flotilla of outrigger canoes and the rowing shells whose crews regularly practice on the Potomac River, the Hokule‘a, with its signature crab-claw sails unfurled, glided past the Lincoln Memorial, the Washington Monument and other notable landmarks Wednesday to dock at the Washington Canoe Club.

There, on a riverbank just below Georgetown University, a crowd that included White House officials, members of the state’s congressional delegation and Native Hawaiian students welcomed the canoe to the nation’s capital.

“What you are doing here … is something that will live on for generations to come,” U.S. Interior Secretary Sally Jewell said at the welcoming ceremony, according to a statement. “So we are enormously proud of the leaders, the crew, the volunteers and supporters of this epic journey.”

The canoe has logged about 30,000 miles in the first two years of its voyage, after having left Oahu in May 2014.

Malama Honua organizers with the Polynesian Voyaging Society have spent at least six years planning the Washington, D.C.-to-New York leg of the worldwide journey — more time than any other leg of the journey, according to PVS education coordinator Jenna Ishii. The two cities are “such huge destinations” for PVS to reach more people about the voyage and its purpose, she said Thursday.

That push kicked off Thursday when a news crew from NPR toured the Hokule‘a with PVS President Nainoa Thompson during a live broadcast before thousands of viewers on the social media site Facebook.

Thompson and other crew members explained how they live, cook and work aboard the canoe — and how they’re able to navigate it without modern instruments — as hundreds of comments and “likes” appeared on the screen in real time.

Ishii said that in addition to NPR, the Hokule‘a and its “Malama Honua” voyage have received interest from CNN, the Washington Post and other outlets during this stretch of the voyage.

“We’ve had all these partners” outside Hawaii, Ishii said Thursday. PVS asked them to “help us reach the media that we can’t in Hawaii.”

“We’re talking to a lot of national outlets that are very interested, especially for World Oceans Day,” Ishii added. That United Nations event takes place June 8 in New York, and PVS is hoping to get U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon to come aboard the Hokule‘a for a second time in the voyage. He first came aboard in 2014, during the Small Island Developing States conference held in Apia, Samoa.

Thompson previously said that to help justify the risk of sailing the Hokule‘a around the world, crews of the traditional double-hulled Polynesian canoe replica vessel would have to reach as many people as possible with the voyage’s message — and they’d also have to share the experience with Hawaii residents, particularly students.

For this leg, “I think that we’ve reached out to as many people as we could have, and it’s now time to enjoy the moment,” Ishii said Thursday. The canoe is slated to stay in Washington through Monday and then arrive in New York on June 5.