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Published: January 15th 2012
Akahanga Ruins
Size comparison!Happy New Years Everyone!
Today was not only New Years Eve, but also our full day tour of the Island with Freida. He picked us up at 09:30 and we quickly discovered that pretty much all the tour companies do the same tour at the same time. For such a small island there sure seemed to be a lot of tourists! (who us? never!) But with our vehicle only having the 3 of us we were quickly in and out of sites (when we wanted to be) and generally managed to stay away from the crowds (which in a big city would have seemed small).
We visited all the main sights on the island, including Vaihu where the statues fell face forward; Akahanga where the Moai are well preserved and this is where the first king of the island was buried. We also saw the equivelant of their housing, with the outlines of the rocks still in the ground, apparently they were created igloo style; low to the ground to keep heat in. For a very temperate climate that made little sense to me, but who knows!
Rano Raraku Volcano and Poike
Akahanga Ruins
Found face up, which was rare (also the quarry where many of the incomplete still rest) was probably the highlight of the day, seeing the statues in varying stages of 'development' including some that were on route and didn't make it. One of the unique statues was found here, he's the only one found carved on his knees, and no one is sure of the significance of that.
Ahu Tongariki, is the most self preserved platform with 15 of the biggest Moais were set, however most perished in a tidal wave in 1960, so some of the ones we saw were rebuilt. Our last stop of the day was at the white sand beach of Anakena, where yet another small platform stood with 4 moai on is, quaint little beach that Michele and I both agreed we wanted to revisit later. The tour took us through the middle of the island to the east coast where we worked our way up slowly to the beach, then took the main road that intersects the island back to town. There are very little use able roads on the NW corner of the island, that area needs to be explored on foot, horseback or bike.
What was so fascinating overall about the Moai heads is the sheer determination of the islanders to carve, move and stand up these monolithic statues. Some of the incomplete ones at the quarry weigh just under 200 tons. They actually had plans to move these! And I believe the largest ones they were able to transport was around 50 tons. All using humans and most likely, trees. As I mentioned there are many theories about the island, which makes it so fascinating, but when the first settlers arrived the island was covered in trees, yet they managed to cut down everyone, using them to most likely transport the statues. You have to wonder what they were thinking when they cut down the last tree; knowing it was the last?
This deforestation changed the minerals of the soil and it stopped being such a lush area and vegetation started to suffer. There are some that say they eventually starved to death, no trees, the soil not being usable for vegetables and fruit anymore and simply ran out of food. The island was inhabited as early as the 12th century, with the first European explorers
Easter Island
Statue on his knees arriving in the 1,700's. Many of the locals were taken as slaves to Latin America, where 90% of them perished, so the remainder were returned, leaving literally a handful to tell the story.
Sadly by the 1,800's the island has around 100 inhabitants, and has slowly been repopulating since then. One of the terrible sides to this story is that so much of the history and the culture got lost because so many perished when they were taken as slaves, and far little was written down. This is one of the many reasons this island is an anthropologists dream; so much to learn and discover with so little history in fact. I found it absolutely fascinating; and while I"m sure I"m forgetting a lot of the facts and accuracy in my brief synopsis; suffice to say it's full of magical wonder and secrets that may never be fully discovered.
Kay, enough history for now:-) It's Party time!
Freida dropped us off and Michele and I decided to have a Patio Party, with Jill our companion Duck. We succeeded. Beer flowed, wine poured, munchies were consumed and much laughter was
heard coming from our patio. We were determined to prolong our outing for dinner, being as they eat so late, but finally by about 8 we were cheetoed out and headed to town, a mere 5 minute walk to the main street.
Unfortunately some of the restaurants were closed, and the others you needed to pre-book. oops. We finally got lucky and one of the restaurants made room for us,a table for 2, somewhere squeezed between the kitchen, the bathroom and the bar. We didn't care; the food was fantastic, the people watching was wonderful from our vantage point and it was New Years Eve and we were on Easter Island!
We wandered down to the beach, where the live band and fireworks display were to happen. Nothing. Crickets. Seriously people? You're supposed to bring IN the New Year, not wait for it to happen then celebrate. Sigh. Canadian vs. Chilean/Rapa Nui culture were not meshing at all. Keeping in mind this was well after 11pm. So we wandered along the shore, looking for a place to at least stop and have a drink while we waited, but everything was
full. Bar didn't really exist, it was all restaurants and everyone, especially the locals were still having dinner. After about 45 minutes of this, we finally conceded, turned on our headlamps and wished everyone a Happy New Year as we sauntered back to our hotel. We did hear the fireworks eventually, not sure what time it was at that point, but apparently the did party eventually! We had started partying at 4pm, apparently the Rapa Nuians prefered starting at midnight:-) oops!
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