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Oh boy, we're off on an adventure!
There's no place to sit at the gate for the flight to Easter Island.
So I'll just walk down the hall and around the corner and down the hall some m ore till I discover an abandoned seat.
Alvaro makes sure we all have our papers. Getting in and out of Easter Island can be a little tricky.
Now we're on our plane where Bill is happy to be photobombed by Cathy.
The food was pretty much edible and the utensils were fashionably wooden.
So five long hours have passed. Bill didn't have a window seat but the nice young lady who did was happy to oblige him by snapping a photo of Easter Island as we were coming in to land.
We had to carry our bags down the steps.
One of the baggage handlers saw me coming down slowly and he rushed up the stairs to help me with my bag. I was doing just fine and I did not need his help, but he was so friendly and we have been warned that on this island if someone offers to help you just smile and thank them profusely and accept. So I smiled and thanked him profusely and accepted. I guess getting old has its advantages.
I know it looks like "torana" but that's just because the dude in the backwards hat is standing in the way. It's really "iorana" and that's the Polynesian word for welcome. The name of the town is Hanga Roa and it's the capital of Easter Island. The Polynesian word hanga translates to "bay," and Hanga Roa translates to "wide bay" or "long bay."
A whole lot of people were being iorana’d.
And if somebody wants to give you a lei, you just smile and thank him profusely and accept.
My first moai, right there at the airport.
We are headed into our home for the next few days, Hotel Otai..
Is that a Pacific Ocean I see down there at the end of the street?
I do believe it is.
Time for a small snack upon arrival.
Yummy. The juice was papaya or something like that. It sure wasn’t like any juice Bill is accustomed to drinking.
Bill is certainly satisfied.
He has a nice room.
With a weird towel with wings on one bed.
And a weird towel without wings on the other bed. I don’t know what it's supposed to be. I never know what to do with these bed decorations. Somebody went to a lot of trouble and I hate to mess up their handiwork, but a man’s got to sleep on a bed!
What do you do with a lei when you don't need it anymore? Just lay the lei down and admire it, I guess.
Our hotel is about one block from the ocean so I took a walk down there by myself this afternoon. The group is going on a walk at 5 o’clock but I got an early start.
An ahu is a platform onto which moai are placed. There may be several moai on an ahu, so it's the ahu that gets the place name.
That's a moai on an ahu.
There's a nice soccer field connected to a community center right in the middle of town.
Just across from the soccer field is a moai on a pedestal and wooden benches surrounding it that make up what is known as Plaza Hotu Matu’a, named by lthe island's governor Dr. Álvaro Tejeda in November 1938, as part of his actions to proclaim himself King Hotu Matu’a. Tejeda tried to revive the culture, the folklore, the history and the ceremony of having a king on the island. Apparently even as recently as 2011 there have been attempts by people to declare themselves king of Rapa Nui, but the title seems never to stick.
There are fishermen here.
Adding mass to the boats with rocks apparently gives the boats a degree of stability in the waves.
Rapa Nui even has a surfer.
Alvaro took several of us on a walk through Hanga Roa.
There's a nice park here.
With horses running free.
And an area set aside as a swimming pool. It's nice, but it's no beach.
Lots of room for picnics, I guess.
And for horses to graze.
This isn’t an original moai, but like the originals it comes outfitted with very impressive eyes. The natives believed that those eyes gave the statues life.
Alvaro explains it all.
While Bill horses around.
That thing on top of the moai’s head is not a hat but instead it is a very stylish hairdo called a pukao.
It's a pretty park with a magnificent location.
If you want to grow something on Rapa Nui you probably want to do it in a rock garden like these. The gardens provide several agronomic advantages, including wind protection, water permeability, reduced soil erosion, and possibly enhanced soil nutrients. They are called manavai.
Looks like an ahu minus a moai.
That's a cemetery.
The graves are well-tended.
And there are plenty of them. We had a nice walk and Alvero pointed out the bank and the post office and the fire station and the pharmacy and all the important things we need to know about during the next few days in Hanga Roa.
Dinner salad. Nice.
The Road Scholars dig in. We had a fine dinner in the open air. The temperature was in the high 60s, low 70s and there was very little humidity. I figured if it stays like this things will just be about mostly almost perfect.
And the food was delicious.
Especially the pretty dessert.
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