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Clive wrote:

> How do you find its direction and how do you deduce that its direction is
> unexpected and therefore of navigable interest ?

Very good point and I'm guilty of not thinking critically about this
info.  Most of my experience with currents is in inland waters where
they can be quite visible (like a line of bubbles between two slightly
different coloured areas of water) as in two big rivers meeting or a
river flowing into a large lake.

On the ocean, you'd be swept along with it and, out of sight of land as
you say, there's no point of reference.  I suppose the only means of
detecting the current is if it regularly swept along flotsam (of the
natural kind) and it could be identified from a distance as one
approached.  Knowing nothing of Pacific currents, I can't say there's
any location where this wild hypothesis is possible.

> It is conceivable the pacific islanders navigated over long distances,
> although I remain unconvinced that they did so with any prepared passage
> plan, but principally I argue that it would be impossible to navigate using
> this method.

If they ran regular trade routes, I can see it possible to do the
planning.  However, your contention that using currents is not feasible
is valid until I or someone can identify a legitimate way to do it.

Mike




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