Many people believe that people have been crossing the oceans for thousands of years.
Some contacts probably did occur, but most accounts of them involve fanciful notions of sunken continents such as Atlantis or Mu or the Vikings visiting deep into North America. The Vikings present some interesting problems for archaeologists because there is documented evidence of their explorations and settlement along the eastern coast of northern North America. At the same time, many contemporary people, especially those of Scandinavian descent in the northern Midwest, have made Viking exploration into the heartland a part of cultural identity and heritage. Information about 1898 archeological find in Kensington, Minnesota, which claims to be the account of 14th century Norse explorers, but is a well-documented hoax. He became famous for his Kon Tiki expedition, a effort to prove habitation of Easter Island by ocean-going peoples from South America.