> I find it hard to believe that they just got on boats heading east deep into the largest ocean on the planet hoping that they would find an island? Consider

> I find it hard to believe that they just got on boats heading east deep into the largest ocean on the planet hoping that they would find an island? Considering that they did exactly that in order to colonize all of Polynesia, it wasn't a belief without solid priors. They had gotten pretty good at picking up signs of land, like by watching migrating birds. Also, many of them probably tried and failed to find new land. We can only see the successes in what were likely many attempts.