'allo 'allo Fifi

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Rapa Nui (Easter Island) is some 4000 miles from anywhere, with a population of just 4000 people making it the obvious place for us to run into a French couple (and their travelling teddy bear Fifi) with whom we had crossed the Vietnam/Cambodia border some seven months previously. Small world...and small island. We had an inkling that the two weeks we had on Rapa Nui might prove to be a little much and after covering the whole island in pretty much one day, meeting most of the local population on an evening out and, as it turned out, knowing many of the people on our campground already (as well as the Frenchies there were a number of people we had met on Tahiti) we realised that five days would probably be enough time to enjoy the delights on offer. Luckily it was easy to change our flight - leaving us free to explore and enjoy the island.
We camped at a spot near the main/only town - Hanga Roa at camping Mihinoa which overlooked the amazing sea with huge turquoise Pacific rollers crashing in. By the end of the week all of our gear was crusted with seasalt.
The first day we hired a 4x4 jeep and spent the day exploring the dirt roads and major sites - the next morning rising before dawn to drive across the island to see the sun rise over Ahu Tongakiri, a line up of 15 Moai. The Moai really are beautiful - the nursery site of Rano Raruku is particularly so. This is where the Moai were carved from thee rocks and there are a lot of them here in all stages of development. Apparently there are some 600 unfinished ones to be seen but we didn't count. Lots of them were knocked over or damaged during warfare between the tribes who built them - the long ears in the east and the short ears in the south (we are not making this up). But in recent decades a lot of effort has been made to upright and restore them.
The island is quite a strange landscape - heavily deforested and quite a bit like the British moorlands. Wild horses were everywhere causing trouble and packs of exuberant dogs who made our morning run a bit of a chore- we would return covered in dog slobber and muddy paw prints having fought off the over- friendly attention of way too many of the beasties.
A real highlight of the trip was the hike up to the crater Rano Kau to view the ceremonial village Orongo - Arriving at the top we marveled at the steep cliffs which the young men used to race down and swim out to the moto (small island) to be the first to return with the first laid seagulls eggs (and be the birdman for the year). We were lucky - just after we returned to camp we looked up at the crater to see a big black swirling cloud had descended onto it. Some of the guys from our campground were still up there and had a rather damp, cold unpleasant time.
High winds, a bit too much rain, lots of ants and pretty festy facilities however meant by the end of the stay we were pretty happy to say goodbye to camping for a while. The guys on the campground were lovely however - greeting us up at the airport with flower necklaces and dropping us off with a little wooden carved moai to remember them by. Waiting for our flight we supped our first pisco (popular drink in South America- a grape brandy with lemon, egg white and sugar, not a bad way to pass time) and then it was onto the 5 hour flight to Santiago.

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