Yap Traditional Navigation

Sailors across Micronesia and Yap have long practiced the art of traditional navigation - open ocean navigation without the aid of modern navigational tools or even a simple compass. They navigated the vast distances of the Pacific Ocean in small sailing canoes, first exploring and settling its many small islands groups, and later carrying out trade and commerce between the island nations that thrived there for almost two millennia, unknown to the Western world.

Traditional Sailing Canoes

The canoe is perhaps the single most important symbol of the Pacific islands, and has played a central role in settlement, trade and commerce. The outrigger canoes of Yap are famous for their speed, performance, versatility and seaworthiness. Their combination of hull shape, symmetry, and outrigger also allow the craft to be quickly reversed when winds change, without the need to turn the hull around.

There were six distinct styles of Yapese canoes used for fishing and specialized tasks like cargo transportation and intra-island travel. The most common style of Yapese canoe is the distinctive two-pronged bow ‘popow’, a sleek, seagoing vessel used for the long voyages to Palau and other distant lands.

Building a canoe is a highly skilled and complicated task requiring the cooperation of many men and women and is supervised by a master craftsman. The entire community participates in its construction, which begins with the selection and felling of a large mahogany or breadfruit and involves a detailed measurement system based on an indigenous mathematical tradition that is both accurate and verifiable. The tree is then dug out and hollowed almost exclusively with an indigenous adze. It is then outfitted with a single outrigger made from bamboo, breadfruit tree trunks and coconut fibre rope, with sails woven from pandanus leaves. The asymmetrical design supports high-speed sailing and allows access to shallow water

The art of canoe construction is still practiced in Yap State today, although many of the magic rituals and initiation rites have been forgotten or abandoned. Yap’s Outer Islanders have been the most successful in their efforts to pass the skills of canoe building and navigation on to younger generations. On Yap Proper, there are now only a few active canoe builders, mostly from the Northern municipalities of Maap, Rumung and Gagil.

However, there is a growing interest across the Pacific Island Nations in reviving and teaching these skills to new generations before they are lost forever. In 2017 a canoe summit and festival were held on Yap Proper to bring together individuals and groups from across the world to help organise and find funding for the preservation of these ancient maritime skills.

The Art of Navigation

Micronesia’s Master Mariners developed the celestial compass, a system of 32 stars whose positions and movements are memorized by rote, and used in combination with directional observations of crisscrossing ocean swells, the movement of the sun, wind, clouds, sea currents, birds, and even fish to successfully navigate between islands groups often hundreds of miles apart. Instruction began at an early age and was taught orally, memorized and practised over and over again. It was the most highly guarded secret of each island clan and Master Navigators held an exalted position in the traditional societies.

Today, this art is a dying skill, but just like the traditional kills of canoe building there is an ongoing effort to revitalise and preserve them. The Yap Traditional Navigation Society was formed to both preserve the art and practice the skills of traditional navigation. Tours can be booked with this Society in Toruw to learn about traditional navigation, to view a ‘popow’ traditional canoe and meet with master canoe builder Edmund Pasan.

In 2023, two Traditional Navigation Society outrigger sailing canoes departed from Lamotrek Atoll, in the Outer Islands of Yap State, to sail to Saipan in the Northern Marianas Islands to attend the 28th Micronesian Flame Tree Arts Festival. The journey took eight days by way of Guam and the canoes, their crew and Master Navigators were the honored guests and highlight of the festival.

Yap Historical Preservation Office
Colonia, Yap
Open: Monday-Friday (7.30am–4.30pm)
Entry: Free of Charge Phone: (691) 350-4226