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9/4/04 MK Our three days in Santiago, Chile’s capital and largest city were pretty relaxing. Santiago, while being a very nice, very livable city, is not particularly interesting. It’s far more western and cosmopolitan than any city we’ve visited in Central or South America so far. Walking the streets you notice everyone is very conservatively dressed looking more like they belong on Wall Street than in South America.
As has been the case in most of the cities we’ve been to, our time there was largely spent planning our travels to the countries more interesting cultural and natural sites. At the top of the list were Easter Island, the most remote inhabited place on earth, and Chile’s Atacama region in the north, including a 4 day tour in Bolivia exploring it’s vast desert and salt flats.
Due to our travel plans, last winter was the first since I was around 6 years old that I did not get in one day of skiing, so I wasn’t going to pass on the chance to make a few turns at Valle Nevado, Santiago’s famed resort just over one hour outside of the city. After renting our equipment, including circa 1972 one-piece ski suits, we headed off for the mountains. Unfortunately, we arrived in a snowstorm and whiteout conditions. After only three freezing cold runs with about 3 feet of visibility, we admitted defeat, changed clothes and retreated to the bar. As we were leaving the clouds parted and we were blessed with incredible views of the picturesque Andes Mountains.
Off to Easter Island tomorrow.
9/9/04 LPK Ya know that excited feeling you get when you are on your way to a new place? If you’re a true traveler, you know what I mean. It’s about anticipation of new discoveries, meeting new people and just plain adventure. I get that feeling every time we leave for a new place. It usually hits me some time after I zip up my bags and just before we hop into the taxi for the airport or bus terminal. Michael and I both had “the feeling” on our way to Rapa Nui; we also had a long time to relish that feeling on the flight there because it is a far away place.
Rapa Nui is officially known by its Spanish name, Isla de Pascua or Easter Island in English. A mere 72.5 square miles, Easter Island is the most remote inhabited place on earth. The nearest inhabited landmass, 1,178 miles west is even tinier than Easter Island and the next nearest “neighbors” are the Gambier Islands, 1,550 miles west. The South American coast is 2,294 miles to the east. Only one airline, LanChile, services Rapa Nui, flying a measly two times a week. A standard roundtrip fare from Santiago to Rapa Nui is about $750 U.S. As you can imagine, importing anything to the island is not easy, so things on the island are a bit pricey. What I’m trying to tell you is that you have to really want to go to Easter Island. You don’t just happen upon it. Of course, this only adds to the intrigue of the place. Who were the ancient people that settled here? How in the heck did they get there? Where did they come from? Why did they construct such enormous statues? And how the bloody hell did they transport them all over the island?
Though many Spanish explorers entered the Pacific from South America as early as the beginning of the 16th century, the first European to set foot on the island was Dutch. Easter Island was so named when it was “discovered” by the Dutch expedition under Admiral Jacob Roggeveen on Easter Sunday, 1722. Roggeveen, along with another crewmember, Carl Behrens, recorded their observations in the ship’s log. They found the islanders very friendly but were obviously confused by the enormous Moai. Behrens, recorded that the islanders:
relied in case of need on their gods or idols which stand erected all along the seashore in great numbers, before which they fall down and invoke them. These idols were all hewn out of stone, and in the form of a man, with long ears, adorned on the head with a crown.
There are a few theories as to how this tiny island was inhabited, but the most commonly accepted answer is that the first islanders arrived from the Marquesas as early as the 4th or 5th century. (The Marquesas also supplied the first settlers of Hawaii and New Zealand.) Rapa Nui legend has it that these explorers traveled by large double canoes with the food and domestic animals they needed for colonization. Between the 4th and 10th century they established a new society and the huge Moai were an integral part of their flourishing culture. As Rapa Nui’s population was increasing, the limited food and natural resources on the island were diminishing, creating strife. And, in 1774, when the famed English Captain Cook led an expedition to Rapa Nui, he found the islanders in poor health and distressed, describing them as lean, timid and miserable. It is widely accepted that near starvation led rival clans to warfare from around 1680 until the time when Captain Cook visited the island. During these wars, rival clans toppled each other’s altars and statues in an attempt to inflict the utmost insult. To this day, the majority of the Moai remain toppled.
As if their internal strife was not bad enough, in the late 18th century, the indigenous people of Polynesia and Easter Island became the focus of outside degradation. European and North American entrepreneurs regarded the Pacific as an unexploited frontier. So, as you probably know from your history lessons, first came the whalers and then came planters in an attempt to satisfy western demand for tropical products like rubber, sugar, and coffee. Christian missionaries also came, undermining and degrading local customs.
The final abuse came when Peruvian slavers made a vicious raid on Easter Island. They kidnapped about 1,000 islanders including the King and all of the learned men, since it was their custom that the highest-ranking men met the incoming ships. The raiders took the men to work the guano deposits (bird poop, if can believe it) on Peru’s Chincha Islands. Many official protests were lodged and the Peruvian government eventually ordered the return of the islanders. Unfortunately almost 90% had already perished due to diseases and hard labor. Smallpox killed most of the rest of them, leaving only a small handful of survivors. Regrettably, the handful of people who survived brought back an epidemic that annihilated the remainder of their population. Only a few hundred traumatized islanders remained. Sadly, the majority of their oral history, culture and tradition were lost. By the 1860’s Catholic missionaries converted the remainder of the population severing whatever thread of connection they had to their ancient culture.
I provide all this information to you not because I am going to quiz you at the end of this journal entry, but because I want share some of the allure and mystery of Easter Island. And, I want to give you a small glimpse of how excited we were to be on our way to such a fascinating place. In the end, Easter Island far exceeded our expectations.
At Kirsten and Patrick’s suggestion (friends we met in the Galapagos), we decided to sign up for a guided tour our first day to get oriented. Unfortunately, the English-speaking guide they recommended was sans vehicle. It was in the shop for repairs. He assured us that he could take us out the following day. The thing is, not only did we not want to wait to begin our exploration; we had heard that a cruise ship was pulling into port the next morning. We had been warned that though the massive cruise ships only stopped on the island a few times a year, they wreaked havoc during their short stays by overwhelming the tourist sites and monopolizing the tour companies.
Luckily, we were able to join a group leaving with Kia Koa tours shortly after breakfast. The interesting people you meet enhance so much of traveling and today was no exception. We boarded the bus with a lovely couple of beekeepers from New Zealand. Clad in their shorts and flip-flops, I thought them quite optimistic about the weather. In contrast, Michael and I were wrapped in our raincoats, long pants, and hiking boots. Sure enough, it was windy and pouring rain by the time we saw our first Moai (pronounced Moo-eye). The Ahu Akivi altar with its seven impressive statues, is the only one on which the Moai face seaward. Our guide Alexandra offered a few competing explanations as to why these seven face the water, however, like many of the questions about the Moai there are more theories than definitive answers. The only thing that seems certain is that the other Moai were erected with their backs to the ocean, facing the villages. A partial explanation of the Moai’s positioning is that the Rapa Nui people believed that evil spirits came from the depths of the ocean. The people built tiny doorways into their huts and routinely scraped their backs on the top of the archway as they crawled in to leave the evil spirits behind. So, you can speculate that there was something about having the Moai, which were representations of their immediate relatives, watching over them and with their backs to the evil spirits.
Alexandra was a terrific guide. Luckily for us, her English was impeccable since she had attended college at Wellesley College in the U.S. As with so many people who settle on Easter Island, she had an interesting story. She was the daughter of a Chilean archeologist who was father to 10 daughters borne from 4 wives. All of the children were raised by their father and most lived on Easter Island.
The rain, fog and wind just made the rest of our day all the more mysterious and fun. We saw the enormous crater of Ranu Kau, an inactive volcano now a lake filled with floating totura reeds - the same reeds we saw at Lake Titicaca in Peru. The crater sat atop a sheer cliff where over 50 tiny Rapa Nui houses remained carved into the mountainside.
That evening we had dinner at a restaurant that would become central to our Easter Island experience. I had read about the sweet little French restaurant, La Taverne du Pecheur, in Smithsonian Magazine while staying at a hacienda near Otavalo in Ecuador. The magazine said that a French guy who married a Rapa Nui woman ran the restaurant. The choices of eateries on the island were limited so we were looking forward to giving La Taverne a try. The restaurant was located at the end of our block, right on the edge of the small town pier and in front of the town’s ridiculously small beach, aptly named Pea Beach. The restaurant’s atmosphere was characteristically French with intimate lighting, flowered tablecloths and small wooden tables and the food smelled wonderful. A delightful and rotund French man welcomed us inside; unmistakably the gentleman mentioned in the magazine. The menu was simple; chicken or a choice of fish with seven local vegetables. We were particularly excited about the vegetables, given we were feeling deprived of fresh veggies by this point in our trip. We both had the local fish with the seven delectable and interesting vegetables.
While we were eating a family came into the restaurant and sat across from us. They turned out to be the very colorful Bernie, his wife and kid. Bernie was a French gypsy from Louisiana who had been living on Easter Island for over 25 years. He married a Chilean gypsy and had 10 children with her. Bernie, a jazz connoisseur, was obviously excited at the opportunity to talk with any fellow Americans who were even vaguely interested in music. He invited us to his home for a little music and coffee. We figured the coffee would be terrible since everyone seemed to drink Nescafe, but we were quite intrigued by the invitation. We knew right away we were in for one of those “travel encounters” when we hopped into Bernie’s open-roofed Hummer that he bought from the Chilean military. We arrived at his home after just a few minutes. He modestly apologized for his “gypsy home” when he offered us a seat anywhere on the living room floor. Bernie popped in one CD after another – some of his favorite musicians and others of him and his friends. He turned out to be an excellent freestyle sort of musician; we spent a couple of hours listening to blaring jazz and drinking coffee on Bernie’s living room floor.
The next day Michael and I rented an ATV vehicle and took a ride along the coast. The rugged coastline reminded us a lot of New Zealand, both for its beauty and for its solitude. Aside from a bunch of shaggy horses, ancient fallen Moai and crumbling altars, we were basically alone on the road. For a few hours we felt like true explorers. We had no idea what we would find; we were just enjoying the ride. Just about dusk we turned a wide corner and caught a glimpse of a shocking sight. Ahead of us lay Ahu Tongiriki, the largest altar on the island. Fifteen statues in all, Tongiriki was restored in 1992 and is situated on the bank of a small bay. The Moai stand guard over a large green field strewn with remains of other statues. We had happened upon the most visited altar on Easter Island. Luckily, tonight there were no tour buses or rental cars. We were alone with the Moai and the wild horses. It is hard to explain, but sitting quietly with the enormous statues while the sun set was a very spiritual experience.
Easter Island was one of the highlights of our world tour and I could obviously go on in detail about each moment. I recommend you go there and see it for yourself. It won’t be cheap and you won’t get there quickly, but it will be well worth it.
9/9/04 MK Easter Island will forever be one of my greatest memories from our world trip. It is perhaps the most intriguing mysterious place on earth. Lisa did a great job writing the details and explaining the mysteries so I am going to keep this short.
Easter Island is an incredible mix of a harsh but beautiful landscape rich with a history that nobody really understands. I’ve seen pictures of the Maoi statues that pockmark the island, but nothing can prepare you for seeing them close-up. On our second day we rented an ATV and drove around the island without much of a plan, or really knowing where we were going. After about 2 hours and a few stops, we were driving on a small windy two-lane road. The ocean was to our right and on the left were rocky rolling fields with small mountains in the distance. It was starting to get late in the day when we came around a corner and suddenly found ourselves staring at a large field with 15 statues standing alongside each other with their backs to the ocean. Perhaps 30 feet in height and each in amazingly good condition, they were enormous impressive figures. Lisa and I had the view to ourselves and enjoyed watching the sunset before riding back to town.
Easter Island is small so we were able to explore most all of it in our brief 4-day visit, but we both agreed it was a place we would have enjoyed spending more time.
9/10/04 MK Just arrived in the town of San Pedro de Atacama in the north. We are planning a couple of days here then we are planning to sign up with one of the excursion companies for a 4-day tour in Bolivia.
Atacama is a very cool small town that has become another haven for backpackers from all over the world. We’ve now been in towns like this in many countries and while they are not very representative of local culture, they are still very interesting places to spend time because of the multitude of seasoned travelers from nearly every place you can think of. The town is a handful of dirt streets lined with low adobe style buildings all catering to tourism. There are hotels and hostels, many shops selling local trinkets, several tour agencies and a number of surprisingly good restaurants. Of course you have to put that in perspective. Very good for Atacama is not the same as for San Francisco or New York. But it was much better than we expected and some of the tastier meals we’ve had in a while.
Our hotel, the Terrantai is a surprisingly beautiful place. You walk through a small unassuming door on one of the small streets into the tiny lobby. Inside, the building is sort of a Spanish colonial architecture with winding outdoor pathways leading to the rooms. The entire place appears to be made from small oval stones placed on top of one another. Easily the most expensive place in town, but still less than $100 USD per night. We have a few local tours planned before heading off to Bolivia.
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