Is that Easter Island, Rapa Nui or Isla de Pascua?!

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Down the steps onto the runway at Rapa Nui airport and my first thought was.... at last, heat! Don't get me wrong, Patagonia had been stunning and I'd loved it but I was also thrilled at the thought of being able to put my fleece away for a few days! The owner of the hostel I'd booked greeted me with a garland of lovely bright flowers and I was whisked off to the hostel to meet up with Ann, Gordon and Eamo once more. It'd only been a few weeks since we last met for dinner on the one night we all overlapped in Puerto Madryn but there was lots of news to catch up on. Again though we were only overlapping for one day - they'd booked their flights a month after me by which time the prices had nearly doubled for my dates so they'd come earlier - but one day was better than nothing and we headed off for lunch, the museum and finally having grabbed a few beers we headed down to the waters edge at Tahai to watch the sun set over the sea. And it was there, as the rest of us walked ahead towards the restaurant that Gordo proposed to Ann! And off course she said yes and we all spent the rest of the evening celebrating in style!!!

Next morning the others headed off to the airport and I set about organising a tour of the island. I've never been very good at organised tours (the whole big group, on the bus, off the bus thing drives me mad) so I opted for a small group tour even though it cost a little more. It turned out to be a great choice as the guide was excellent, (turning up in a classic VW van to take us round in!), the rest of my group, a French guy, two girls from Hong Kong, a Japanese girl and a German girl were all really friendly and we had a great day driving around the island in the coolest van on the road looking at statues!

Named Easter Island by the island's first recorded European visitor, the Dutch explorer Jacob Roggeveen, who encountered it on Easter Sunday 1722, the Polynesian Island of Rapa Nui as it's called locally is known for it's huge stone moai. Basically they're massive statues(the largest is 10m high), with the heads being overly large compared to the rest of the body and carved with distinctive straight prominent noses, long ears and pouty lips. Created between 1500-1700AD each represents a deceased long-ear chief or other noble. So far some 887 have been found, many of which never made it out of the quarry at Rano Raraku where they were carved. The quarry was actually my favourite site on the island - the rows of moai at places like Tongariki and A Kivi were impressive and the sunsets at Tahai stunning, but the quarry was something special. Almost everywhere you walked there was a moai, perhaps on the path right in front of you, or maybe hidden in the rock face where only the basic outline had been chiseled away. Some were leaning over at alarming angles, others were buried in the ground up to their neck. But none were finished. The moai were only completed once they'd been transported to the place where they were to be erected. Quite how they were transported is a point of conjecture - the largest weighs 80 tonnes, smaller ones maybe 50 to 60 tonnes - but once there the final details were added and the eyes carved complete with white coral and black obsidian pupils. Sometimes a Pukao (top knot carved from red scorcia) was also added. When the first Europeans visited Rapa Nui they found many moai still standing tall and watching over their clan lands, but by the time later visitors arrived many had been toppled over, an act that occured during the clans wars. Some have since been re-erected as part of conservation projects.

The next day I headed south along the coast to Orongo and the Rano Kau crater. The sky was bright and sunny (or at least it was on the way out.....), the sea was a deep inky blue and white wave tops crashed down on the black volcanic rocks of the shoreline. Along the way I stopped at a cave where images of the birdman had been painted onto the roof in bright colours. The Tangata manu (bird-man) post dated the moai and was the winner of a traditional competition on the island that ran to as late as the 19th Century when the cult was suppressed by missionaries. The winner was the man who collected the first Sooty Tern egg of the season from the islet of Motu Nui, swam back to Rapa Nui and climbed the sea cliff of Rano Kau to the clifftop village of Orongo. The Birdman cult was also responsible for the stone village and birdman petrogylphs carved into rocks at Orongo. The crater itself is on the coast and stunning with its walls eroded back to form high sea cliffs. Almost a mile across and 300m deep fresh water fills the bottom far below where, with its own microclimate, vegetation flourishes and grass grows in thick mats on the waters surface.

On my last day I set about a longer hike to see the remaining moai I wanted to visit (all 800 odd seemed a little much even for me... ;o)). Some 8 hours later I fairly collapsed back at the hostel! The route hadn't been in any way difficult but the sun had been blazing for the last part and I think perhaps I'd had a wee bit too much sun. Things hadn't started out that way though when only an hour in to the walk I found myself hunkered down under my umbrella as the most torrential rain storm passed over. Later as the sun came out and I sat drying off I watched as more storms passed over both along the way forward and the way back.... hmmm. To be honest I think I'd seen the best moai on the first day but what made this walk were the stunning coastal views that I had for the first few hours or so. A great last day on Rapa Nui!

Next up, star gazing and salt lakes in northern Chile!

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