Day 57 - A bit of a pushover

Easter Island

Something we didn't expect is that a large number of the moai have been pushed over and are lying face down on the ground. At one time (by the 1830's) practically all of the moai had been pushed over, and have only been erected again in the 20th century. It's generally believed that warring clans on the island paid each other back by pushing over their very important statutes.  About 50 moai have been stood up over the past 50 years and many of the areas have been reconstructed.

We picked up our hire car around 10am and headed off around the island in an anti-clockwise direction, stopping at each site along the way. The first few sites all had fallen moai and platforms (known as ahu) that were in poor condition.

We eventually arrived at Rano Raraku, the quarry where all of the statues were created. The quarry is the most extraordinary sight, moai after moai appearing as if they are walking down the hill out of the quarry onto their destination. There are many moai in various stages of carving - it's almost as if someone yelled, "that's it we're out of here" and everyone downed tools and walked away - leaving the moai stranded. The quarry was on the sides of an extinct volcano, so we also walked up to see the crater lake, as well as more partly built moai in the distance.

After the quarry the next stop was Tongariki, where fifteen moai have been re-erected. They were originally toppled in the island wars and later swept inland by a tsunami.

Further around we saw some rock carvings, and then we stopped at Anakena, a bit different to the rest of the island, as instead of rocky shores and the crashing waves of the Pacific there was an idyllic beach with beautiful sand, waving palm trees and a lovely row of Moai, that until recently had been buried in the sand.

After Anakena the road circling the island headed inland, meaning we were unable to drive to a section of the coast with more moai sites. We drove up to the quarry at Puna Pau where the red scoria topknots (called pukao) were manufactured.

That was it for today's sightseeing, after Puna Pau we arrived back in Hanga Roa. Even though it had taken us all day to travel around the island, it's only 20 minutes in a car from one end to the other.

Tonight we found another lovely restaurant a little outside of town with a great view over the water, and a great vantage point to see the sunset and also watch groups of islanders powering through the ocean in long outriggers.