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23/09/2007: "KAPINGAMARANGI ATOLL ....... August 1969"

Modern DNA tests show a connection between aboriginal people of Taiwan and true polynesians who migrated throughout the Pacific Ocean beginning maybe 600 years ago.

The author of Kon Tiki (Thor Heyerdahl......) proposed the polynesians originated in South America then migrated throughout the Pacific.

This new information has them travelling to South America, and originating from Taiwan and the Philipines, which is to the south of Taiwan.

This week I received an email from Bill Logan of Florida who, as a young sailor in the USN aboard a submarine, called at Kapingamarangi in 1947.

There is little doubt that anyone who has visited this tiny atoll 1.5 degrees above the equator, a part of the Federated States of Micronesia, will have a lasting memory of the atoll.

For myself and three team members who went there in August 1969 it became the best adventure of our lives. It also cemented a friendship that last's until this day between the four of us.

Team leader, Barry a retired marine biologist grows wine grapes in Western Australia.

Second in Command Ken, runs marathon races in Hawaii and dives with a metal detector to find hundreds of gold wedding rings and watches in the surf.

Richard is a retired marine biologist in Massachusetts, and a former correspondent for fathom magazine in Australia. and finally yours truely.

I must do more with the beautiful pictures and 16mm movie footage we obtained on that amazing expedition.