".. While Cook was impressed with the speed of the Polynesian canoes—they could literally sail circles around his ships—he came to question the islanders' abili

".. While Cook was impressed with the speed of the Polynesian canoes—they could literally sail circles around his ships—he came to question the islanders' ability to make long, intentional sea voyages. He records an account of a group of Tahitians who, helpless in the face of a contrary wind and unable to set a course for home, drifted hundreds of miles off course and were marooned on Aitutaki, in what is now the Cook Islands ..." This idea is conflicting with skills of Joseph Banks "exotic souvenir", Tupaia. There is no doubt Tupaia played a big part in filling in the gaps of Cooks maps with his innate knowledge of 1000 of so South Pacific Islands. You can't get the kind of cartographic knowledge without someone having observed the island and recorded them. So the question is how? Another thing to remember is Cook was the "master navigator". His idea of a long sustained voyage was to sail in 30m ship from Plymouth to Australia, New Zealand followed by a leisurely stop over in Hawaii. Cook also had access the latest navigational aids like the "Larcum Kendall K1 chronometer" in his second voyage.