If you’ve not heard of Thor Heyerdahl’s epic Kontiki expedition, it might be worth booking a trip to the museum in Oslo to see the raft for yourself, as this movie will leave you inspired by such an epic endeavour.

This ambitious sailing endeavour defies belief that a project like this was even possible (let alone only a few years after World War II ended), so If you think ocean rowing is the tip of the maritime adventures spear, then you’ll want to find out about Heyerdahl’s incredible project, the 2012 film is a really rich story of how it came together.

Heyerdahl was a Norwegian anthropologist who, after a year on a Polynesian island (Fatu Hiva – itself a huge achievement for the time period in my estimation), believed that the Polynesian islands were settled by South Americans and not the West. His hypothesis was that they had sailed around 5000 miles to the region many thousands of years beforehand, yet wasn’t widely accepted by the scientific community. So he set out to prove it, by building a replica raft from Balsa wood and the exact materials they had, and sailing it there (as you do to prove hypotheses!).

He recruited a team to make it a reality, and in 1947 (having won financial backing), set off from Peru. Over a hundred days later, the team landed (ran aground) on the Raroia atoll thereby completing the expedition to worldwide acclaim, with the original 1950 documentary film winning an Oscar.

The original Kon-tiki raft was bought back and now on display in the Kontiki museum in Oslo.

2012 version https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1613750/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1

1950 version https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0042650/?ref_=fn_al_tt_3