THE AMAZING 15 MOAI OF AHU TONGARIKI

WEATHER: It’s so unpredictable-windy and cool, windy and hot, hot, sunny and cloudy

HIGHLIGHT OF THE DAY: The whole day tour was incredible hard to pick one thing

BUMMER OF THE DAY: The weather all over the place but was blue for all the photos

WORD OF THE DAY: MOAI (mo-ay) they are just incredible

It was my second day tour and after what I saw yesterday I was really looking forward to day 2.  I have an additional day here tomorrow and I asked Ellen if there was another tour I could do to see more of these amazing Moai’s, but there isn’t, so I could do a horse riding safari or hire a car and drive around myself.  The drive option scares me a little as all the sights are in the middle of nowhere and if I got stuck or needed help I am not sure how long I would have to wait for help.  Even though it is a happy little island, some parts seem a little in hospitable.  So instead I will walk into town as I have a few things to do there.  One, the post office stamps your passport with an Easter Island stamp.  When you are processed during immigration they do stamp your passport but as they are annexed by Chile it is just a plain old boring Chile stamp, which I have like 8 of those already, so this is a must.  Two, while I am at the post office I will need to buy stamps for my post cards and three, I need to do some shopping.  I saw these lovely rock moai yesterday and I think I just might have to buy a couple, the thing that puts me off buying them is they are rock.  My bag already weighs a ton, but they are a really cool souvenir.  I’ll see how I feel tomorrow. 

So after driving around for the usual pick-up, the good thing with the island being so small, this only takes 30 minutes we were on our way to our first stop. Akahanga.  It is a site in ruins and some also call it "The King's Platform" or "The Ruler's Platform". The ruler Hotu Mato'a (or Hotu Matu'a) is believed to be buried close to this place.  There are 4 platforms, 13 moai and 8 pukao (sort-of hats, also called "topknots") have been constructed here.  It is a beautiful part of the island located directly on the coastline and contains the destroyed ahu (platforms) and overturned moai (statues) with huge topknots scattered around the site.  Keeping in mind the statues were built for important people after they had died, when they were completed they were erected facing the village to protect them and give them good spirits.  So when you see a platform or ahu, it is a sign that a village once stood in that spot and the reason why yesterday to see the 7 Ahu Akivi facing the ocean was quite unusual.  It was quite barren this side of the island and very very windy.  I wonder why the indigenous population would settle here where there was no protection from the winds except their home that they made from the local volcanic rock for the base but then built the actual structure from wood.  It was a stunning view, but I am sure that they didn’t build their homes 600 years ago based on the view!  It truly was stunning though.  All 13 moai’s were tumbled, but when standing, these statues must have been impressive, but the fighting between clans put an end to that. There is something pretty sobering to see these massive statutes lying face down having been pushed over in war, it really is like a memorial stone (just on a BIG scale) to loved ones lost in a world gone by.  Some specialists have plans to restore the site; others oppose it and believe that Akahanga is better left untouched in its original state.  I think it is good to leave some of the sites untouched so people can see them in their raw state, as impressive as the restored one look; it is also impressive to see these monoliths facing the ground in their final resting place, even if that is not what they were made for.  It has been tough for me to not pick up a small stone, not off the actual sites but just from anywhere to keep but even removing a single rock can result in years of jail. The rules are strict and this way helps preserve the sites for future generations.  So no rocks from Easter Island, unless I purchase the ones I saw yesterday.  They had some small artesian stalls set up here as we left and I saw my statues again so I asked the cost.  They are around 30cm in size, carved from the local rock and were 75USD a pop.  I am an even kind of gal, so I would have to buy 2, but after asking around they sell them in town, so I may be able to get them a little cheaper and I need to think where the hell I am going to pack them for the next 7 weeks, but I keep thinking about them, so I know I will end up buying them tomorrow.  I just know it.   

Back onto the bus and our next stop was Volcan Rano Raraku.  I wasn’t sure what to expect here except the images that I had from Volcan Rano Kau yesterday, I knew I wouldn’t be disappointed.  Well this was the quarry where all the moai’s were made and then transported all over the island.  As we drove in you could see about 50 moai all scattered all over the outside of mountain.  This was a dream come true to see all the moai’s and I had to pinch myself to really believe that I was here.  It really was an amazing race of people and I don’t think they are given enough credit for their constructions and the movement of these 80 ton statues.  We had to show our national parks entrance ticket here for admission and I was smart enough today to bring my Globetrotters book, so I now have my Easter Island box stamped and accounted for before we started the walking tour of the site. 

Most of the 900 moai in the island come from the slopes of the Rano Raraku volcano. In this unique place, hundreds of sculptors and artists worked between the years 1000 and 1680 to produce giant statues of volcanic stone. We were getting the chance to walk through the external and internal slopes of the Rano Raraku where we could use our imagination and contemplate the mass building of these impressive statues, most of them with their body buried. A lot of the moai have been covered by dirt, landslides and rubble.  In this site, a total of 397 moai have been counted. Except for their hat (pukao), which came from a quarry near Hanga Roa (Puna Pau), their eyes (made of coral, obsidian or tuff) and their ornamentation, the manufacturing process of the moai was executed almost completely in the same place. 

On the outer belt of the crater is the quarry location, which also offers splendid views of the south of the island.  Rano Raraku is on UNESCO's World Heritage List and is among Easter Island's top travel attractions and I can see why.  You start out with a mild walk past 2 moai that didn’t even make it out of the quarry.  One was massive at over 10m tall.  Once a moai had toppled or fallen before getting to its final destination, it was considered bad luck then to erect the statue and another one would have to be made.  Talk about tough love.  Almost everyone has seen the iconic images of the Easter Island statues staring silently out from the hillsides. I can see now how most people think that all moai face the ocean based on this site, these pictures are part of the iconic ones that circle the world when now I know that it is the exact opposite.  But what great pictures they made.  At Rano Raraku the statues face away from the crater.  The fact is these statues were not meant to have stayed in this place. The Moai that you see half buried on the sides of the volcanic cone of Rano Raraku were pieces waiting to be transported to ahu (platforms) around the island. The Moai that you see sticking up out of the ground have bodies that extend down underground 6-12m, all the way to the waist. Centuries of erosion from the slopes above have covered all but the tops of these giants.  As we walked up a rocky path (that you are not allowed to veered off at any time) we saw more and more of these magnificent moai and they all looked different, each and every one if them.  At the highest point that we are allowed to walk is the largest Moai ever constructed. It is one of the unfinished moai, completely carved but not removed from the crater wall, is a staggering 21m in length. Many doubt this statue could ever have been raised successfully. Giving their ingenuity and obsession, I believe they would have eventually stood this massive piece of rock. Unfortunately the sun was in the wrong spot by the time we had made it to here, so I got some photos but they aren’t the best.  We then stated to make our way back down the other side, but not before turning around one of the rock walls to get a panoramic view of the island and in the distance we could see the 15 moai of Tongariki.  I was so excited like a kid in a candy store!  These 15 looked impressive and they were just dots on the horizon, imagine what they are going to look like close up!!!  We were going to visit this site after lunch.  The slopes of Rano Raraku are filled with eye-less moai, several hundred of them circle the crater in various stages of construction, each one was a photo opportunity and I just couldn’t stop snapping.  There are some that disagree that these statues were finished pieces waiting for transport and believe that they were never meant to be move from the slopes surrounding their birth place. Perhaps it was a "Moai Showroom" of sorts where local leaders could come and pick out their favorite design!  We will never know, but it is nice to have your own theory.

Finally, the strangest Moai ever found on Easter Island is the odd "kneeling" statue which we saw on our way back down and is one of the very few that was carved with legs.  Found by archaeologist Thor Heyerdahl's team in 1955 on a part of the Rano Raraku quarry near no other statues it stands, with the islands panorama behind him in a kneeling position.  It is a very realistic piece compared to the traditional moai (erected moai are of men’s torso’s only ending with their arms over their stomach’s) 

And it is unclear whether this was a very early piece or a later development. Its location, away from the other carved moai is also unusual. One legend says that this is a representation of a famous moai carver, erected to watch over future generations of the craftsmen. 

What a great way to kick start the morning.  The outer walls of Rano Raraku were awe inspiring to say the least.  We had walked in a massive circle getting us back to the first moai that we saw that morning.  We had one more place to stop and that was to see inside this beautiful volcano.  The walk was a 15 minute trek up a gradual slope with the last section having around 20 steps to get us to what I can describe as a paradise.  I can see why the crater of Rano Raraku is known as its most beautiful crater on the island. It is filled with rain water and plantation giving it a lake appearance, but there are no fish, frogs or any wildlife here except a few introduced birds, which seems weird as it looks like the perfect place for all these animals.  The interior of the caldera contains many finished and unfinished moai as well. Erosion has covered many nearly completely and it's possible more lay beneath the ground, covered by hundreds of years of erosion. The potmarked walls from which the moai where carved can clearly be seen in the interior of the Rano Raraku caldera just above the crater lake.   The crater is located on the eastern slopes of the great Maunga Terevaka, which also happens to be the highest mountain of the island.

We climbed our way back down to the visitor center where lunch awaited us.  This was included in my day tour and supplied by a third party company that had also supplied table cloths and made the picnic tables very festive.  We were given a chicken, rice and salad for the main dish, with a bread roll, a drink of choice and jelly with fresh fruit set in it for dessert.  It was delicious and after eating the whole thing I couldn’t fit in my bread roll so I donated that to the very hungry looking dog that was stalking the joint waiting for just that very thing! So with us now watered and fed, stopping for a toilet break and some souvenir shopping opportunities ( I bought 3 postcards and a sticker) we were back in the bus for our next stop and totally excited for was Ahu Tongariki.

Ahu Tongariki is the largest ahu on Rapa Nui/Easter Island.  The large flat plain below Rano Raraku provided easy access to the quarry and as a result the largest of the moai where erected here.   Tongariki is only a kilometer from Rano Raraku and located in the Rapa Nui National Park. All the moai here face sunset during Summer Solstice. Ahu Tongariki was the main center and capital of the Hotu Iti, the eastern confederation of the Rapanui.  Its moai were toppled during the island's civil wars. In 1960, an eight-mile tsunami caused by an earthquake off the coast of Chile swept and destroyed the platform and swept the massive moai hundreds of yards inland, the statues, weighing up to 30 tons each, were carried more than 150 meters.  It has since been restored in 1992 by a team from Japan brought who bought in cranes and other heavy equipment with a mission to restore Ahu Tongariki. Working under the direction of Chilean archaeologist, Claudio Cristino the task took five years. Now all 15 of the moai stand proudly ,including an 86 tons moai that was the heaviest ever erected on the island that stand once more at what is arguably Easter Island's most impressive site.  This ahu is on the south coast of Rapa Nui, close to two previous volcanoes, Rano Raraku and Poike.  Poike is one of the three main extinct volcanoes that form Rapa Nui, which last erupted between 230,000 and 705,000 years ago. Rano Raraku is a volcanic crater formed of consolidated volcanic ash or tuff, which compose the carved moai. Indeed, nearly half (hundreds) of the moai are still buried in the slopes of the Rano Raraku, the main moai quarry. The large, flat plain below Rano Raraku provided easy access to the tuff.

After stepping out of the bus I got my, well I have lost count now, my WOW factor.  It is so hard to express into words what these magnificent statues look like in real life!  They are stunning, massive, BIG, imposing and incredible.  I am glad that they took the time and the money to restore these guys as they were awesome.  Ellen took a photo of each of us with a moai at the entrance, gave us a spiel about the site and then we were given free time here.  All of the moai originally had on their hat (pukao) but after the tsunami and the reconstruction they didn’t know which pukao belonged to which statue so they have just lined them all up to the right of the ahu.  When the reconstruction was completed, the following morning the archeologists returned back to the site and one of the moai had his hat (pukao) on so they decided to leave it there and is why it is the only one wearing one.  We were so lucky with the weather, we had a clear blue sky and the photo opportunities were endless.  I took a minute to just sit down and stare up at these amazing works of art.  Especially the largest ever erected at 9m tall and 86,000 ton, will these statues ever be moved again by nature?  She has a weird sense of humor that woman and I hope that it never happens but it gives you an idea on the force of the tsunami for it to move things made of solid stone weighing that much, it is truly terrifying to think of it like that.  The moai are understood to represent clan leaders/ ancestors. Many activities took place at the ahu including burial and cremation.  I just couldn’t stop looking and taking pictures of this site, I could easily have spent another hour here, but the tour must go on, so with a final glance over my shoulder as I got on the bus and one more photo out the bus window as we drove off, the time and the expense of coming to this tiny island was so worth it to just see that amazing site of Ahu Tongariki and I have to place in my Top 10 of things seen on my whole Odyssey to date, and that is a BIG call after 404 days on the road today. 

From here we travelled a further 15 minutes to the site of Te Pito Kura, located north, not far from Ovahe Beach.  This is a small site with a tumbled moai with its topknot fallen.  This moai is the largest one ever finished, but it lies face down. Given the name Paro, it is the biggest moai ever moved and erected onto an ahu (platform).  It is almost 10m tall and weighs around 80 tons.  The pukao (hat/topknot) weighs approximately 12 tones also being one of the largest ever carved and moved from the Puna Pau quarry, that we visited yesterday.  Traditional tells that the erection of this moai was ordered by a widow in the memory of her late husband.  Paro was one of the last statues knocked down from its ahu sometime after 1838.  After what we had just seen it was a small and not very exciting site, except for its claim that it was the biggest ever successfully moved and erected moai.  The other piece of interesting point about this site is that it has been approved for restoration in the next 12 months.  So it will be pretty cool once it has been completed to say that I saw it in its original state and to then see the completed project will be a great claim of fame for me.   While the new restoration will be interesting there was a stark beauty to the site in its demolished state that will be lost. While it is tempting to raise all the moai that have been toppled due to the war on the island or natural events, part of the history is altered by doing so. It is discussed that due to the harsh weather conditions some statues are better protected in their fallen state. 

A rock deemed “the navel of the world” is said to have powers was located within walking distance from this site which was surrounded by a rock fence, with ‘the rock’ in the center and 4 smaller rocks set up as seats.  When touched it is supposed to give you the energy of the earth and when I compass is placed on the rock it makes it go all crazy with the special magnetism it contains.  After placing my hands in the rick I was disappointed that I didn’t feel this ‘energy’ but there were a lot of people around, so maybe they had sucked it all up?  

We were back in the bus for our last stop of the day and that was the beach of Anakena and the Ahu of Nau Nau.  The legends of Easter Island say that Hotu Matua came first came ashore here at Anakena Beach and that this was the island's first settlement. Excavations of the site have confirmed that it had been occupied for a very long time. The current ahu is built upon the remains of several others and the same precise stone work is found in the buried ahu as that of Ahu Vinapu. Again, this is curious because one would expect the more advanced stonework work have been done during later periods of the island's development.  We were given an hour at this small piece of paradise, which gave us time to see the Ahu and to get some beach time.  I think I am coming down with a small cold, so I didn’t bring my swimmers with me, which I was fine with even after getting there as it was still kicking up a breeze, nothing like we had in the morning on the south of the island, but enough for me to not have a swim even if I had of bought my togs. 

I made straight for the Ahu, as it was just after 3.30pm and we were starting to lose light for the pictures as the sun was now behind the moai’s.  But on the upside it gave us some great silhouette pictures and also some shadow shots that we haven’t got from the other sites based on the time of day, so it was nice to get some contrasting shots.  What is striking about the statues at Ahu Naunau are the red scoria headdress's (known as Pukao) that fit on the moai heads. These are the only moai’s we have seen over the last 2 days to have their pukao on their heads (except the single one at Tongariki).  The pukao were carved from a different quarry than those of the moai that contained large quantities of the red lava rock. Many of the moai on the island originally had pukao and they are found alongside the fallen statues in many sites. It is believed that they were installed by building a ramp of stones up the side of an erected moai and then rolled up where they could be placed on the top. Afterwards the ramp was disassembled.  As for why the Rapa Nui began putting the pukao on selected moai remains a mystery. Heyerdahl, referring to the mysterious red headed race that was reported on the island concluded that they represented topknots of red hair. Other archeologists point to the tradition of placing a large stone on the image of a dead leader as a sign of death and mourning.

The statues at Ahu Naunau are also known for the detailed carvings on their backs. As they were buried in the sand for so long this helped to preserve them and are the only ones where you can see their original tattoos on their backs.  Along with traditional loin cloth carvings there are fishhook patterns that are found on none of the other statues.  The detail work in the statues at Ahu Naunau is truly remarkable. Precisely chiseled facial features, the now familiar long ears and thin lips are all carved on the Ahu Naunau statues to a degree not seen at other sites. Although, not the biggest of the moai, they are clearly the most refined. A fitting tribute if this is, indeed, the site of Rapa Nui's first settlement.

After exhausting my photo opportunities, getting some people to take my photo as I struggled to get a self-take picture here with the light, I had 20 minutes to pull up a piece of beach, take off my sneakers and roll my feet and squelch my toes in the most amazing sand I have felt in a long time.  It may have something to do with my feet killing me (I think the sneakers I bought in La Paz aren’t quite right for my feet).  But the sand was white as white and fine as salt.  It was really a beautiful spot on the island.  There were hundreds of palm trees that were imported from Tahiti in the 80’s and it really gave it its tropical feel.  It was weird to be looking at the ocean, seeing the palm trees swaying in the breeze and then moai with their backs to the ocean, only 20m away.  It was very surreal and a great way to finish off a GREAT 2 days of touring.  It really was a mind blowing experience to see all these moai (statues) over the last 2 days and it will be an experience I will never forget. Ever.

From here we were back in the bus for our ride back to centro and hotels.  It took around 30 minutes and that was to dive literally from one coast to another and we were on a main paved road.  Some of the internal roads that we travelled on were rock and quite bouncy in some places.  It is a little strange as they lead to some of their most visited attractions of the island, you would think they would invest money to pave these roads.  It probably explains why all the rental cars on the island are Suzuki Jimny’s which a cute little 4WD.  Drew used to own one and they are pretty cool to dive.  We also called them Tonka trucks as they do have a toy like quality to them. 

Doing the hotel drops, driving around town it is pretty funny to see people from yesterday’s tour, I waved and they waved back, to see people that I stood behind in the customs queue or recognized from being on my flight.  It is one of those places where people are remembered and generally you don’t need to stay longer than 4 days to have seen the whole island and what it has to offer.  As mentioned I have a free day tomorrow, so I will head into town and just chill Eater Island time and re-pack my bag for airline travel again for Sunday.  I will just need to know if I will be packing literally 2 rocks (moai statues) or not. 

Dinner was at my mega expensive hotel again and I am happily sad to report I had the chicken and prawn dish yet again and it was as delicious as it was the first day, and the second day and then tonight.  I am not a creature of habit, am I?  But I just may have to have something different tomorrow night as my going away dinner. 

I go to sleep tonight with a smile on my face knowing that I am home in 49 days.

I go to sleep tonight with a smile on my face thinking about the message that Zeme sent that he has an appointment with the Australian Consulate on Wednesday and glad that that process is on its way.

And I go to sleep with tonight with the memories and photos of Easter Island and my last few days which have been inspiring to say the least.  This is an incredible place.