21st November – 15 moais and caves and cliffs.

The traveller moai

I woke up early to see the sunrise. Prior to that actually happening, I found a darker part of the hotel as there was a lot of ambient light from the buildings and looked at the stars. I managed to work out where south was using the Southern Cross and also east using Orion. The sunrise was a disappointment as there was a lot of cloud on the horizon so all that I saw was a crimson area of cloud.

At 09:30 we set out to see the 15 moais on the south eastern part of the island at Tongariki. On route, we passed the doomed horse that had eaten the lupin and he was significantly weaker with his back legs beginning to buckle.  It was very upsetting to see.  Tongariki has the quarry behind it and a gradual slope towards the sea nearby. These have been re-erected having initially been torn down by the various tribes and further impacted by a tsunami in May 1960. The first moai, near the entrance, was in fact a traveller as it had been to Osaka. I wasn’t sure if it went to raise funds or as a thank you having done so, but the Japanese had paid for the restoration of these 15 and their associated ahu.

The famous 15.....

Only one of the moais has a top knot as most were too badly damaged to put back on. Vai pointed out a boat house - so called because of the shape that these small dwellings take. In the shaped basalt rock you can see circular indentations that sugar cane poles were placed to create a roof structure on which reeds and grasses would then be placed to provide waterproofing.

We took a lot of pictures of these impressive moais before returning to the mini-van and heading towards the north side of the island.

The beautiful coast - just missing marine iguanas!

The walk was along the shore line and Vai pointed out where farms and dwellings were. Again there were boat houses and close to them cooking areas. He also pointed out chicken coops. These are rectangular in shape and seem to be completely enclosed with no entrance. He explained that there was a hidden way to get inside and that was for security reasons to stop someone taking your chickens in the night. We stopped at a larger and smaller round stone. Via explained that these stones where used as ballast for the paddled catamarans that the Rapa Nuis used. Some of these stones have magnetic properties which he demonstrated using his compass and some believe have supernatural powers. Nearby was a circular stone structure. Vai explained that these were used to teach the youngsters the night sky and that this round structure only focussed on part of the sky, usually Orion as the legend has it that to get to/from Rapa Nui you followed the line created by the belt.

The gorgeous cove with red cliffs - top knot coloured...

Continuing walking we passed through a field of horses, some of the mares were quite pregnant and others with foals. After this we came to a small beach where the cliff was comprised of a very reddish rock. I thought this was where we were going to swim, but I was wrong as we got in the mini-van and headed further north to Anakena beach. Here there are changing rooms and a larger sandy beach with palms under which there are stalls selling food/goods/drinks etc. 

Impressive, eh?!!

Having got changed (Tamsin and Gill had decided to paddle) I dropped my towel with the American ladies and walked into the sea. I was expecting it to be colder than it was and was warmer than the swimming pool at the hotel. I was joined in the sea later by Heidi (one of the Americans) and Jackie (from Monkston, Hants!!!) who had joined our trip.  Tamsin also took some photos of more moais re-erected on the beach with the palm trees in the background, which was closer to how they must have originally looked before all the palm trees were chopped down.

The Seven.....

We were unsure what to do after lunch as we’d heard that the walk to the 7 moais and the two caves wasn’t worth the effort. Jackie who had been on the island for a few days disagreed and said the last one might be worth passing if you don’t want to have to scramble inside. So we decided to go. The 7 moais at Ahu Akivi are quite complete and differ from the other ahus in that these all face the ocean whereas the others face inland. The reason for this our new guide, Nuku (Vais 2^nd cousin) explained was that these faced where the Rapa Nui had come from an island called Heva(?). The legend has it that Heva was sinking and the King had a dream that told him to head east towards the sunrise (and following Orion’s belt) where a new island could be found. He sent out his 7 best sailors who found the island. These seven are represented by the moais on the ahu.

The view out of the lava tube

Walking from here we entered into a lava field. Most of this now has vegetation on it. Nuku pointed out places where trees had grown well in the collapsed lava tubes due to the water retention and resulting humidity almost like a greenhouse. We came across a large “greenhouse” and Nuku pointed out taro, sugarcane, avocados, and other crops growing wild. We descended into the collapsed part of the tube where there were bananas growing. Cathi was helped down the steps as she doesn’t do heights well. Nuku then produced two flash lights and I produced my own. We then went into the lave tube. Cathi was a bit unsure about this, but between us we persuaded her. Carefully we went into the tube which Nuku said went all the way to the ocean (about 1-2kms away). We weren’t going that far as we took a left turn and popped up about 60 metres away from where we went down.

Who's that...?

We continued in the direction of the ocean and eventually came across another cave. As Jackie had described, you needed to get down low as the roof was quite low. Cathi decided she would try getting in as her two friends had gone ahead with Nuku behind them. Actually at this point she didn’t have a choice as Gill, Tamsin and I were right behind and had no plans of reversing. To Cathi’s credit, she made it despite her reservations and her height and we all enjoyed spectacular views of the ocean from the two windows looking out onto two small islands to the north. We all agreed afterwards that whoever had said it wasn’t worth the effort was wrong.

Looks weird..?

About 25 minutes later we came across the mini-van. This was a welcome relief as we were all getting tired and had sore feet from all the racks that we had to walk over. Our relief turned to delight as Nuku produced some very cold beers. The mini-van then took us to the edge of Hanga Roa (the main town on Rapa Nui) and the site of the complete moai. This has finished eyes which are made using coral. We all agreed that the complete moai looked a bit scary and like the eyes of some paintings we felt it was following us around, which I suppose was the original idea.

Not sure if they always do this, or it was because it was Cathi’s birthday, but Nuku and Kori (the mini-van driver) had laid on some champagne and nibbles when we got back from looking at the moais.

We had dinner with Cathi, Holly and Heidi that evening and it will be sad to see them leave in the morning, but Patagonia beckons for them. We started dinner late and when the lights dimmed we thought we were being ushered out. Our disappointment quickly turned to delight when the staff started singing "Happy Birthday" to Cathi - yup, we'd forgotten about that. Happy Birthday Cathi!