Viking Ship Of Popsicle Sticks Sets Sail

On Monday night I heard a story on CNN about the Viking ship made of popsicle sticks that recently set sail across IJesslmeer lake in the Netherlands. One of our sister sites, Engadget covered this story when the ship was first completed. The hope for this ship is that it will be seaworthy enough to follow the Viking route to North America. An accounting of the project was also covered in last Saturday's The Gazette, a Montreal paper. There is a photo of the ship as well. (This photo is a popsicle raft featured in garretsbridges.com. Maybe a post idea for our newest sister site DIYLife?)

The story behind the popscicle Viking ship story is intriguing. Robert McDonald, the man in charge of this project, was badly burned as a child and his family killed in an explosion. Afterwards, because of his injuries, he was told that he wouldn't be able to do what other kids can do. Ever since he has gone on to prove the naysayers wrong. He writes about his life and projects on his Web site, OB Viking Ship. Come to think of it, it does seem that McDonald, an American, is unable to do what most people do which is to buy a normal ship instead of building a replica of a Viking ship out of 15 million recycled popscicle sticks with the help of 5,000 school kids. His aim is to show that what people think is impossible is possible and intrigue kids to manifest their dreams. Here's a TV report from the Netherlands on this latest undertaking to cross the Atlantic. There are English subtitles. I love this story.

Filed under: Activism, Arts and Culture, Stories, Europe, North America, Netherlands, United States, Video