Ship Society Presentation

written by Young Explorer Henko Roukema

Life as a Young Explorer has certainly given me many opportunities to develop new skills, meet many different people from all walks of life and to share the PANGAEA message with different audiences!

Being a Maritime Studies  student, I was recently invited by the Ship Society of Cape Town to give them a presentation about the YEP Nunavut expedition. The Ship Society members are all interested in sea-going vessels and exploring the oceans, so they were very interested about the YEP Nunavut expedition as we sailed the Arctic seas – something very few sailing vessels get the opportunity to do.  

With the Pangaea referred to as  the “4x4 of the seas” they were amazed to see all the places Mike Horn & the YEPs have been to on board the Pangaea during the last couple of years! Apart from sharing my experiences of the daily routine of life on board the  Pangaea, I also prepared a more technical display of the vessels’ design plans, the building process, her technical specifications and off course focused on her environmentally friendly design features.  Everybody agreed that there is no other sailing vessel in the world that can compare with Pangaea and they cannot wait to “meet” her in 2012 when she visits Cape Town!

Although  I originally thought it will be a bit intimidating to be the guest speaker for an older crowd, I have to admit this was such a positive experience for me! The audience was so interested in hearing about a new generation of Young Explorers and our dreams and passion for the world! They had so many questions for me – the knowledge we gain from learning from experts such as Prof Roswitha Stoltz while on an expedition proves the success of the YEP. This helped me to share our research results on how climate change affects the Arctic and the Inuit lifestyle. The topic of Climate Change is made a reality for others as we can now share stories of actually seeing how the Arctic glaciers are melting, how Inuit tell of their struggle to hunt with their prey moving further & further away and how we saw the Arctic sea ice getting less with more & more icebergs floating right past us!

With Cape Town known as the “gateway to Antarctica” , slides of famous sailing vessels that have travelled to the Antarctic were shown and I was once again reminded of the truly adventurous spirit of the explorers of previous centuries! The first Captain of South Africa’s polar exploration vessel , the SA Agulhus, was also an invited guest & it was great to  hear his stories of sailing the southern polar seas. My ultimate dream is to visit the southern polar regions next to compare it with what I saw in the northern polar regions…

The Ship Society’s message to all YEPs is to keep on exploring wherever we are and to keep on inspiring others to join in our projects as they have seen how the world has changed for the worse during their lifetime. Everybody agreed that the Pangaea Young Explorers Program gives them a  lot of hope for our planet’s future !

Ship Society Presentation with YEP Henko Roukema