‘We’re going to do it,’ paving the path for wahine paddlers

HONOLULU (KHON2) — The Na Wahine O Ke Kai Canoe Race is a test of strength and resilience, credited to a group of women who proved the skeptics wrong.

Veteran Molokai paddler Penny Martin recalled growing up watching the Molokai Hoe in the years before the Na Wahine.

“The highlight of the year was to go down and camp and watch the start of the race and I always thought ‘Wow, I wonder if wahine will ever do it,'” Martin said.

She also remembered the contrarians who said women would never be able to cross the kaiwi.

“That just sent sparks right, that’s it, we’re going to do it.” Martin recalled that fateful day during the 1975 Molokai Hoe races when history was made.

“These bunch of women came down, and we’re like ‘Wow, what are you guys doing?’ ‘We’re going to do the channel. We’re just going to do it.’ This was that renegade crew Carlene Ornelez, Sig Tanahil, Hannie Anderson, those ladies. They said you should come with us but I had never even practiced, or done any, I didn’t know what water changes were or anything so I didn’t go. Big regrets,” Martin added.

Those brave women were not in an official race, but they did it anyway to show everyone they could.

Though Martin did not cross the Kaiwi that day, she did go on to do it years later…in the 1998 Na Wahine O Ke Kai.

“I loved it and I think like I did 15 of them. I just tried to do as many as I could before I got too old or they stopped doing it.”

Now at 72, she decided not to race but continues to paddle and is forever grateful to that renegade crew of women.

“It just took a bunch of women who believed they could and strong women to say ‘Hey, we’re just going to do it’ because nobody thought they could and nobody would listen to them and nobody believed that. So they said ‘We just have to go and do it and show them that we can.'”

After four decades, Na Wahine O Ke Kai continues to inspire women to push themselves. It is still considered to be the ultimate proving ground for paddlers.

KHON2 will stream both the Nā Wahine o Ke Kai and the Molokai Hoe on KHON2.com and broadcast on KHII.