Photos of Torres Straight Isaland Canoes and also canoes from far north Queensland Australia. Torres Straight is the straight between the top of Cape York Peninsula, Australia and Papua New Guniea. The earliest depiction on canoes shows very long canoes with two small sails near the bow. We can speculate that these canoes used sails for going downwind, and used paddles at other times. This may not have been a huge issue as the distances travelled were not that great

Later with the introduction of Europeans to the area, the spritsail was introduced. Pearling became a large industry, though this was mainly done with Pearl Luggers. Many of the photos date from around 1880. Outrigger canoe technology spread as far south as Cooktown area, about 800km south of the straight, beyond that smaller simpler canoes were used mainly for bays, rivers, estuaries etc.