Hell YEA we are here!!!!!
Trip Start
Mar 09, 2007
1
39
169
Trip End
??? ??, 2008
Rapa Nui,
Chile
Saturday, May 12, 2007
Everything about this place is a mystery. They don't know why the natives built the statues. In fact they aren't even sure as to how the natives got to the island in the first place. The island is located 2,237 miles west of Chile in the Pacific Ocean and the closest piece of land to Rapa Nui is 1,290 miles away and is the tiny Pitcairn Island (which is east). I guess an easy way to think about it is if you were to fly from Chile to New Zealand, about a third to halfway there, you would fly over Rapa Nui. It is said to be one of the most isolated places on earth.
So how the hell did people get there? Its still unknown and there are several theories. Some people say they came from other Polynesian Islands. Others claim that they came from South America. Ever hear of the book 'Kon Tiki?' Its the true story about a voyage made on a simply constructed raft that sailed from Chile to Rapa Nui. Thor Heyerdahl was the leader of this expedition and I believe there were 4 or 5 other members on this raft with him. Thor was trying to prove his theory that Rapa Nui was settled by South Americans. He did this by constructing this raft using the same materials and technology that would have been had by the people of that time, really basic stuff. Anyways, they made the voyage successfully, proving that it is possible.
I think its pretty incredible that people left their original homes into the wide open ocean on these tiny little boats and got to this island. And thats the amazing part, Rapa Nui is not big, its a fairly small island, and its in the middle of fucking no where. The fact that people just set off into the huge Pacific Ocean on their tiny little rafts or canoes without a clue where they were going and just happened to arrive at this tiny spec of an island in the middle of no where?! That just blows me away.
By the way, just about everything comes here by plane. Anything that can be brought by the commercial airliner is done so. I think all the big stuff is brought by a boat, but that is not very often. LAN is the only airline that flies here from South America and they have two flights a week (it might be three actually). There is also another airline that flies from Tahiti, about the same frequency. Everything here is more expensive since the cost of getting it here is more expensive.
It was overcast and humid when we got off the plane. We got picked up at the airport by our host, who is originally from Germany strangely enough, and got settled into our spot. Tom found us a really sweet cabana and we have our own bathroom and kitchen, really nice spot. There is only one main town called Hanga Roa (where we are staying) and this is pretty much where everyone lives (there are about 3700 people that live on the island). There are other farms and houses scattered around the island, but no other towns.
We had our first walk around town and arrived at our first Moai. Those things are so damn cool. This one is right in town and is kind of small. We took some pictures but since it was overcast, the light was real flat and the pics not so worthy. We decided to make the 4km hike to an Ahu (the platform alter thingys) that was outside of town, called the Ahu Vinapu. There are some Moai here, but they aren't standing, that have all fallen. In fact all the Moai on the island had all fallen, been pushed down during tribal war, or by tsunamis. The ones standing today have all been restored in modern times.
Ahu Vinapu offered nice views up the eastern coast (its close to the southern tip). Ahu Vinapu is pretty interesting because the Ahu wall is constructed exactly the way the Incas constructed their walls. The wall looked like the walls of many of the temples and ruins that we saw in Peru. The construction of this wall is one of the supporting theories that the natives came from South America. The Moai here were quite interesting, but they haven't been restored, so they are all on the ground. Interesting none the less since they haven't been moved or touched since.
We came walked back around the other side along the south, passing along side the other side of the airport runway. The original runway here was actually extend by NASA so that the shuttle would have an alternate landing sight in case of an emergency. Its pretty damn long.
