Time: 3:00 - 5:00 pm

Location: Heeia State Park
Heeia State Park is just north of Kaneohe. Pull into the parking lot and look for us at the west end of the lot near the canoe halau - you can't miss us!

Here is the map to Heeia State Park.

You are invited to attend the Annual Foundation Meeting to be held at Heeia State Park at Uncle Bobby's canoe shed. Please bring your family and friends.

The meeting will have small pupus and drinks. Feel free to bring your own if you like too. Uncle Bobby will be giving a brief update about the Foundation's activities over the past year and you can pick up brochures to tell your friends about the work of the foundation.

"You will be able to see the koa canoe restoration projects that we have been working on. I hope to see you there." - Uncle Bobby

Save the Date!
We are having a General Membership Meeting at Heeia Park from 4 pm - 7 pm. We'll be having light pupus and Uncle Bobby will show us the continuing work on the Hoʻolale and Meʻe canoes.

We are also in the process of setting up online membership payments. We hope you will join our foundation and support the work of preserving Pacific Islands Canoe Culture.

To make sure we keep you informed, please sign up for our email newsletter!

Here is an excerpt from the article:

A koa tree takes the better part of a century to grow to the height required by a canoe maker. A tree’s life doesn’t end once it is cut down, though. “A canoe is a living thing,” Kekua said. “A tree is a living thing. You make it into a canoe, it’s still living.”

There’s a lot more to what Kekua, Puakea and Puniwai are doing than simply building the vessels. Trees are given new life as gorgeous canoes. The sport of canoe racing gets a boost. And in teaching the craft to the next generation, another one of the world’s great traditions is being preserved. As Puakea notes, “It’s part of our heritage, and part of our culture. We love what we do. Bottom line.”

In January and February we had our annual paddle workshop. It was a small one but enjoyed by the attendees.

In April Uncle Bobby did a workshop for the Bishop Museum at Heeia State Park about canoes and the ocean.

On May 26th we participated in E Malama O Ke Kai festival at Kapiolani park. We took the hoʻola (Uncle Bobby's koa canoe) to the park for display and he also demonstrated the work he is doing for the foundation.

June and July was vacation, graduations and paddling for many of our members. Uncle Bobby and Pat went to New York to check out the Liberty Challenge Race. Hopefully we will be able to participate in this race with a koa canoe in 2010.

August we went to the state race on Kauai. It was a wonderful sight to see all those koa canoes racing in the bay. After that we sponsored a women's and men's crew in the Kona long distance race on labor day. Both crews used the Halani (a koa canoe that was built by Uncle Bobby and Uncle John). It is one of Kamehameha Canoe Club's racing canoes.

In September we sponsored a crew in the Na Wahine O Ke Kai race between Molokai and Oahu. We would like to thank Alana Burrows for a job well done in coordinating everything from lodging, transportation and food. She did a wonderful job and everyone had a great time. It was nice to see them all smiling when they finished the race. Everyone was very happy.

Also in October we sponsored a men's crew in the Molokai Hoe race and they did a great job. Both the men's and women's crew used Uncle Bobby's koa canoe, Ho'ola. In the race. Uncle Bobby is now working on the Ho'ola to redesign her. Being able to watch her in the races gave him the opportunity to determine what he wanted to do when he started to work on her. He would like to thank both crews for using her in the races. He loves to watch her in the water. The foundation would like to congratulate both crews for a job well done. We also want to thank Ropati of Pacific Paddler Magazine for putting in a full page on our men and women paddlers.

The next item for us was our annual Ho'ola koa project on the Big Island. We went to Hilo for the weekend of October 28 and 29 and went directly up to Umi Koa ranch. We had the opportunity this year to have the manager of the ranch give us a tour of the area where indigenous plants were planted earlier.

This year we did cleaning of invasive plants instead of planting more trees. We were able to see the many koa seedlings we had planted previously and marvel at how they have grown in only one or two years. There were a total of 27 participants this year from Honolulu and Hilo.

Our ongoing projects are still going at Heeia State Park and everyone is invited to come and participate and learn. We are now in the process of working on the koa canoes from Healani and Leeward Kai canoe clubs. We also have two logs and two other canoes that are projects in the near future. Coming up in 2008 is a paddle workshop, if you are interested in it please check out the website for details.

The Puakea Foundation would like to give heartfelt thanks to Roxanne of Bare Feet Studios, for all of her hard work and dedication in maintaining our website. She is doing a wonderful job for us.

We wish all of you a Mele Kalikimaka and Hauʻoli Makahiki Hou!

Uncle Bobby, Pat, Hovey, Beth, Alana, Ricky

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They raced "iron" - which means the entire 18 mile course with no crew changes.

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A crew of Golden Master Women (all 50 and older) participated in the Na Wahine O Ke Kai in September, 2005. This 12-woman crew featuring paddlers from Hawaii and California, earned Third Place out of six canoes in the division of women aged 50 years and older in 2005.

Their time of 7 hours 29 minutes tells us us what a grueling race this was! Uncle Bobby served as their coach, and he picked a winning course by studying the currents out in the Ka'iwi Channel - 41 miles between Molokai and Waikiki, Oahu. Many special mahalos to the Leeward Kai Canoe Club for loaning the Puakea Foundation a canoe for this women's long distance race.