Gonzalo Figueroa Garcia Huidobro is) widely accepted, but from South America. In 1947, Heyerdahl successfully sailed the balsa-wood raft "Kon-Tiki" from Peru to the Tuamotu Islands in an effort to prove it could be done. The subsequent Rapa Nui expedition was meant to be less of an adventurous experiment and more of a true scientific expedition. Figueroa was a twenty-four-year-old graduate student in archaeology at the University of Chile and working at Santiago's natural history museum when he joined Heyerdahl's expedition as the official representative of Chile and liaison officer, or, as Edwin Ferndon referred to him, "a 'watchdog' representative." He was also to
Kon-Tiki expedition sailed roughly west carried along on the Humboldt Current. The crew's first sight of land was the atoll of Puka-Puka on July 30. On August 4, the 97th day after departure, "Kon-Tiki" reached the Angatau atoll. The crew made brief contact with the inhabitants of Angatau Island, but were unable to land safely. Calculations made by Heyerdahl before the trip had indicated that 97 days was the minimum amount of time required to reach the Tuamotu islands, so the encounter with Angatau showed that they had made good time. On August 7, the voyage came to an end when the