Easter Island
Easter Island is not big. It's about the same size as Lichtenstein (168 sq km), with a population of just under 5000 people. Despite being a five hour flight out into the pacific, I was expecting a little plane with little or no amenities. I had my novel ready to go. I could barely believe it when our assigned gate was connected to a 787 Dreamliner, one of the best planes in the sky. Despite the amazing transport, this was still with dodgy LATAM airlines, who reinforced the skeptical opinion I hold of them when, after leaving the gate and making our way towards the runway, we had to go back because they "forgot three people". This added an hour plus to our journey time, so I managed to squeeze in three movies on my way across the pacific.
The massive size of our airliner was a total mismatch to the tiny airport in Hanga Roa, the only town on the island. I had never left a plane this big by walking on the tarmac before. A sleepy late arrival to a sleepy town slap bang in the middle of nowhere was helped along by the pickup service to my hostel. I had booked a dorm, but this was not a dorm in the normal sense - a side room with six beds just plonked alongside each other (no bunks) was the unusual cozy arrangement. There was an older Chinese couple occupying the other end of the room. When I arrived close to midnight, I felt like I was intruding in their bedroom.
Once the curtain of darkness had lifted in the morning, I got my first view of my surroundings. It wasn't bad at all, with the ocean and some nice cliffs in view. I hadn't slept all that well due to the humidity, but with five days to "do" the island, I could afford to take it easy on my first day and go for a leisurely stroll around the town. It wasn't too dissimilar to Puerto Ayora on the Galapagos, a typical slow-paced island town, with a smattering of tour companies and restaurants catering to both local and tourist alike. I could tell it was a small place because there wasn't even an Irish pub.
Typical of small towns, my hostel was not really a hostel at all, but a home where they had built a few extra cabins. From the outset it felt like saying as a guest at someone's house rather than a backpacker joint. This wasn't a surprise - Easter Island is outside the usual backbacker budget.
I spent a large portion of the day planning and booking, with snorkelling pencilled in for the next day, and after an epic search I managed to book a guided tour of the eastern part of the island for later in the week. Pretty pleased to have sorted things out, I headed for the museum, which was small but informative. I never knew that the original inhabitants of Easter Island were polynesian, the same peoples that were the original populators of both New Zealand (who became the Maori) and Hawaii. Those people really got about, across thousands of kilometres of open water to relatively tiny islands. Incredible stuff.
With all the background information gleamed from the museum swirling around in my brain, I was now ready for a first encounter with the iconic moai, heading for Ahu Tahai. "Ahu" refers to the platform or altar that the moai (head statues) sit on. It's presumed that the head statues represent deceased leaders, and they were constructed to allow them to be worshipped. One thing is for sure - with their enormous size and location adjacent to the sea, they were built with an imposing, ominous presence. I was pleasantly surprised to have one of the world's iconic images all to my self. Because it's so difficult to get to (unless you happen to be in South America already), tourist numbers here were far from overwhelming.
My walk back to the hostel produced an unexpected bonus. I happened across the town's graveyard, which illustrates the typical Spanish colonial mix of indigenous and Catholic beliefs held in this area, with some amazingly colourful and decorative gravestones - far more interesting than the usual grey and black ones. Some food for though for my own one in the future.
Snorkelling was the main activity of my second unhurried day on the island. After the amazing waters teeming with wildlife in the Galapagos, the snorkelling here was nothing to write home about, some intermittent flute-like fish being the only thing of interest. The boat trip to the site and back was more of interest, with great views of the sheer cliffs on the south side of the island, as well as the rocky outcrop around which we swam.
I shared a happy hour cocktail and some food with an Austrian policewoman who was part of my snorkelling group, and we joined her friend to watch the sun go down behind some moai. At a guess, every tourist on the island did the same, but it still wasn't very crowded. The view was stunning, and not a million miles away from the colour changes in the Uluru sunset I experienced a few months back.
The next morning began with a sleepy introduction to a new guest in the hostel dorm, Gabriela from Buenos Aires. She ended up getting the final place in the day tour I had booked. Rano Raraku was a good place to start, as this was both the quarry and the workshop for the moai. The hillside was dotted with stone heads, some finished, some not so finished, some big, some small. Stony carvings in the rock face gave some clues to how the heads were manufactured - they were carved directly in the rock, before being carved loose and transported to their final destination. There are a few competing theories as to how they were transported, but no one knows for sure. Whatever technique was used, it must have been a huge amount of work, taking weeks to months depending on the distance.
Next up was the big one, Ahu Tongariki, the most famous of Easter Island sights that you may well know from postcards. Here, fifteen heads of various sizes stand stoutly next to a rocky shoreline lined by cliffs. Like most iconic sights, pictures just don't do it justice, with location, both of the statues on the island and the island itself, being key to the experience. If you saw these huge pieces of carved rock in a museum, it would be impressive, but not in the same league as seeing them in their natural location in one of the most remote inhabited places on the planet.
After a delicious lunch, we paid a quick visit to one of the ahus that was left in its original state. It was interesting to see this, as this was how all the ahu and moai were originally found by the first Europeans to visit the island. A combination of fighting between different indigenous groups, and a lessening of importance in the belief system involving the moai, meant that by the time the Spanish arrived, not a single moai was standing upright across the island. All the standing moai you see today have been restored to that state by archeologists and other appreciators of history.
The final stop mixed moai with something more typical of a Pacific island - the gorgeous white sand Anakena beach. We had less than an hour enjoying the glorious sunshine in the water, but I made the most of it, knowing full well that after this I'd soon be heading further and further south to colder climates, followed by the European winter.
I ended up joining Gabriela and two other Argentenians for some post-tour food and more happy hour cocktails. On our way through the town we passed by the local community hall and a sports hall. In both locations we happened across locals practicing for the upcoming Tapati festival. This is an annual celebration, and from what I can gather it's meant to be amazing. We were lucky to get this taster - even the group dance practice, with a huge number of dancers in something akin to a flash mob, and live music, was a joy to witness. No photos or videos were allowed unfortunately.
My final full day on the island was spent touring the area just north of Hanga Roa on a mountain bike. I had secretly hoped to do this alone, at my own quick pace, but politeness meant that Gabriela joined me. Before heading north we visited Orongo Ceremonial Village, which was the centre of the "birdman" religious belief system that supplanted worshipping the moai in later times. Once a year, representatives from each tribe would take part in a race, where they would race down the cliffs to the water, swim across to the rocky island of Moto Nui, and try to steal the first egg of the season of the sooty tern bird. The first to return to the main island with an egg became the king for the next year. I guess it makes them more deserving than just being born in the right family.
An extremely rocky path meant the cycling, and general progress, was slow on our tour of the northern area. An old cave, which used to be a hiding place for locals during times of conflict, was fun to explore, but by the time we reached the final set of moai at the most northerly point of our tour, the intense sun had withered away the motivation to cycle much further. Luckily it was an awesome high-speed (for me) downhill cruise on tarmac back to the town.
Easter Island is a tough place to get to. I loved the novelty of being in such a remote place, with thousands of kilometres of empty ocean in every direction. If you don't happen to be in the Chile area already, is it worth a visit? It's an amazing place, but probably not in my opinion. Combined with some time on the South American continent however, it's a magical extra stop, and I have no regrets about my detour to this tiny volcanic outcrop.
More photos from Easter Island
The massive size of our airliner was a total mismatch to the tiny airport in Hanga Roa, the only town on the island. I had never left a plane this big by walking on the tarmac before. A sleepy late arrival to a sleepy town slap bang in the middle of nowhere was helped along by the pickup service to my hostel. I had booked a dorm, but this was not a dorm in the normal sense - a side room with six beds just plonked alongside each other (no bunks) was the unusual cozy arrangement. There was an older Chinese couple occupying the other end of the room. When I arrived close to midnight, I felt like I was intruding in their bedroom.
Once the curtain of darkness had lifted in the morning, I got my first view of my surroundings. It wasn't bad at all, with the ocean and some nice cliffs in view. I hadn't slept all that well due to the humidity, but with five days to "do" the island, I could afford to take it easy on my first day and go for a leisurely stroll around the town. It wasn't too dissimilar to Puerto Ayora on the Galapagos, a typical slow-paced island town, with a smattering of tour companies and restaurants catering to both local and tourist alike. I could tell it was a small place because there wasn't even an Irish pub.
Typical of small towns, my hostel was not really a hostel at all, but a home where they had built a few extra cabins. From the outset it felt like saying as a guest at someone's house rather than a backpacker joint. This wasn't a surprise - Easter Island is outside the usual backbacker budget.
I spent a large portion of the day planning and booking, with snorkelling pencilled in for the next day, and after an epic search I managed to book a guided tour of the eastern part of the island for later in the week. Pretty pleased to have sorted things out, I headed for the museum, which was small but informative. I never knew that the original inhabitants of Easter Island were polynesian, the same peoples that were the original populators of both New Zealand (who became the Maori) and Hawaii. Those people really got about, across thousands of kilometres of open water to relatively tiny islands. Incredible stuff.
With all the background information gleamed from the museum swirling around in my brain, I was now ready for a first encounter with the iconic moai, heading for Ahu Tahai. "Ahu" refers to the platform or altar that the moai (head statues) sit on. It's presumed that the head statues represent deceased leaders, and they were constructed to allow them to be worshipped. One thing is for sure - with their enormous size and location adjacent to the sea, they were built with an imposing, ominous presence. I was pleasantly surprised to have one of the world's iconic images all to my self. Because it's so difficult to get to (unless you happen to be in South America already), tourist numbers here were far from overwhelming.
My walk back to the hostel produced an unexpected bonus. I happened across the town's graveyard, which illustrates the typical Spanish colonial mix of indigenous and Catholic beliefs held in this area, with some amazingly colourful and decorative gravestones - far more interesting than the usual grey and black ones. Some food for though for my own one in the future.
Snorkelling was the main activity of my second unhurried day on the island. After the amazing waters teeming with wildlife in the Galapagos, the snorkelling here was nothing to write home about, some intermittent flute-like fish being the only thing of interest. The boat trip to the site and back was more of interest, with great views of the sheer cliffs on the south side of the island, as well as the rocky outcrop around which we swam.
I shared a happy hour cocktail and some food with an Austrian policewoman who was part of my snorkelling group, and we joined her friend to watch the sun go down behind some moai. At a guess, every tourist on the island did the same, but it still wasn't very crowded. The view was stunning, and not a million miles away from the colour changes in the Uluru sunset I experienced a few months back.
The next morning began with a sleepy introduction to a new guest in the hostel dorm, Gabriela from Buenos Aires. She ended up getting the final place in the day tour I had booked. Rano Raraku was a good place to start, as this was both the quarry and the workshop for the moai. The hillside was dotted with stone heads, some finished, some not so finished, some big, some small. Stony carvings in the rock face gave some clues to how the heads were manufactured - they were carved directly in the rock, before being carved loose and transported to their final destination. There are a few competing theories as to how they were transported, but no one knows for sure. Whatever technique was used, it must have been a huge amount of work, taking weeks to months depending on the distance.
Next up was the big one, Ahu Tongariki, the most famous of Easter Island sights that you may well know from postcards. Here, fifteen heads of various sizes stand stoutly next to a rocky shoreline lined by cliffs. Like most iconic sights, pictures just don't do it justice, with location, both of the statues on the island and the island itself, being key to the experience. If you saw these huge pieces of carved rock in a museum, it would be impressive, but not in the same league as seeing them in their natural location in one of the most remote inhabited places on the planet.
After a delicious lunch, we paid a quick visit to one of the ahus that was left in its original state. It was interesting to see this, as this was how all the ahu and moai were originally found by the first Europeans to visit the island. A combination of fighting between different indigenous groups, and a lessening of importance in the belief system involving the moai, meant that by the time the Spanish arrived, not a single moai was standing upright across the island. All the standing moai you see today have been restored to that state by archeologists and other appreciators of history.
The final stop mixed moai with something more typical of a Pacific island - the gorgeous white sand Anakena beach. We had less than an hour enjoying the glorious sunshine in the water, but I made the most of it, knowing full well that after this I'd soon be heading further and further south to colder climates, followed by the European winter.
I ended up joining Gabriela and two other Argentenians for some post-tour food and more happy hour cocktails. On our way through the town we passed by the local community hall and a sports hall. In both locations we happened across locals practicing for the upcoming Tapati festival. This is an annual celebration, and from what I can gather it's meant to be amazing. We were lucky to get this taster - even the group dance practice, with a huge number of dancers in something akin to a flash mob, and live music, was a joy to witness. No photos or videos were allowed unfortunately.
My final full day on the island was spent touring the area just north of Hanga Roa on a mountain bike. I had secretly hoped to do this alone, at my own quick pace, but politeness meant that Gabriela joined me. Before heading north we visited Orongo Ceremonial Village, which was the centre of the "birdman" religious belief system that supplanted worshipping the moai in later times. Once a year, representatives from each tribe would take part in a race, where they would race down the cliffs to the water, swim across to the rocky island of Moto Nui, and try to steal the first egg of the season of the sooty tern bird. The first to return to the main island with an egg became the king for the next year. I guess it makes them more deserving than just being born in the right family.
An extremely rocky path meant the cycling, and general progress, was slow on our tour of the northern area. An old cave, which used to be a hiding place for locals during times of conflict, was fun to explore, but by the time we reached the final set of moai at the most northerly point of our tour, the intense sun had withered away the motivation to cycle much further. Luckily it was an awesome high-speed (for me) downhill cruise on tarmac back to the town.
Easter Island is a tough place to get to. I loved the novelty of being in such a remote place, with thousands of kilometres of empty ocean in every direction. If you don't happen to be in the Chile area already, is it worth a visit? It's an amazing place, but probably not in my opinion. Combined with some time on the South American continent however, it's a magical extra stop, and I have no regrets about my detour to this tiny volcanic outcrop.
More photos from Easter Island
Comments
Post a Comment