Index
Day 1: Flying
Day 2: Arrival
Day 3: Easter Island
Day 4: Easter Island
Day 5: Easter Island
Day 6: Santiago
Day 7: Return
Easter Island
Starting the day with the Pu o Hiro hike, a mostly flat trek along the northern coast to a little fishing village, one of the few sandy beaches on Easter Island, Ovahe Beach-- really a little cove-- and then the other sandy beach, Anakena beach. The fishing village sat on a tiny little harbor with a little automated lighthouse and perhaps the cleanest outhouse you'd ever see, and not far beyond was the cove hiding Ovahe Beach. Black lava rock made up the cove, and not far over the hill/bend was Anakena Beach and its moai and its many imported palm trees.
Aha Ature Huki is the moai site at Anakena Beach, and unlike other moai sites, the majority of the moai have top knots (top hats?), and the platform they are on is pretty high.
Rano Raraku, the quarry where most of the moai were constructed, was the afternoon stop. There are so many moai here it's incredible, and the details speculated on about the transport process were almost like a storybook. Many partially-carved moai were evident in the hillside, including some massive ones that would have been potentially twice the height of the tallest erected moai (9 meters finished, up to 21 meters for some of the unfinished) (!). Two of the most famous moai that have graced more than a few magazine covers are here, too.
Quick hike on Te Ara O Te Moai to wrap up the afternoon. With a better appreciation of how moai were transported, appreciating the many fallen and abandoned moai on the hike was a lot more significant, and details such as the extended, angled bases on each moai that ended up ground away during transportation were very apparent. Ended up on the coast again where you could soak in the sun and the waves.
Food at hotel today was a lot of local white fish, both in terms of ceviche as well as cooked. Was pretty good as ceviche, not quite as interesting cooked. Pavlova (meringue) for dessert was a big thing too, all very mild mango and pineapple flavors dominated by the meringue. Wrapped up the night with some astrophotography, taking advantage of the clear skies and the sheer remoteness of Rapa Nui. 1,200 miles to the nearest populated island (Pitcairn Island is 1,289 miles/2,075 kilometers away) makes for some terrifically dark skies.