Tuesday 1st June - Easter Island

By Claire

Wednesday, 2nd June 2004 21:44

p>We'd been awake from about 2am because the storm was making so much noise on the iron roof and the palm tree outside our room was bashing against the walls. At 5am it was still raining, so we gladly went back to sleep until it stopped. We had the car today as well, and, after more marzipancakes and a chat with a French couple at breakfast, we had some directions in mind for today. We went to a souveneir market and then to the bank to get some money. We waited for about an hour, then, suitably replenished, went for a drive to all the bits of the island we didn't see yesterday. We found a collection of seven moai, the only ones that face the sea, we found lying down ones and sideways ones and headless ones, and took photos of them all. We found caves too, and underground springs, and cliffs and more waves, and the factory mountain where the giant heads got their giant hats. I was hoping to see some petroglyphs, which are stone carvings, but we had no luck. As we only had about an hour of daylight left we decided to race up the last volcano to the national park and see if they were there.

Halfway up the volcano there was a viewpoint, so we dutifully got out and viewed. The enormous crater was a reedy lake, with the sea behind it, and it was beautiful. With the sun going down rapidly, however, it was a race against time to get to the top while we could still see, so we carried on up the hill. At the car park at the top we had to climb through a fence because it was all closed up, and then we ran over fields and along paths looking for anything that might give a similar view to the one I'd vaguely seen in a guidebook. With only minutes of daylight left we found the stone carvings, weird curvy shapes cut into blocks of volcanic rock, and took yet more photos. Mikey ran all the way back to the car because, in a very un-Mikey-like lapse he'd left the keys in the ignition and the bags in the car and thought that someone would have driven up the hill in the dark to steal a car that they didn't know was there. Of course, the car was safely where we'd left it.

Back in town we stopped for supper and took the car back. We're going to be doing a bit of walking tomorrow, and packing ready for Tahiti. Our flight isn't until 9pm, though, so we have the whole day to see all the things that are close.