Moais Out The Wazoo

I woke up bright and early this morning to the sound of gusting winds, crowing roosters and the beep of the emergency light turning on (the electric plant on Rapa Nui runs by diesel generator and often doesn´t have enough power to meet the demand so the power cuts out a lot). At breakfast this morning they were playing some music from the island and I was sort of half listening. It was pretty cool sounding, very Polynesian. Imagine my surprise when I listened more closely to the words and hears ¨my bonny lies over the mountains, my bonny lies over the sea!¨ I suppose it´s a fitting song for the geography but it´s not exactly a song I would associate with this part of the world.

It was a rainy and windy day killing any hope that I might be vacationing on a tropical island. Actually I did know coming in that the island is outside the tropics and it is winter in the southern hemisphere so I was expecting rain, unlike some people I met in my travels who had been in Argentina and got quite the shock when they got there because they had no idea it was going to be cold! Sometimes I have no idea how people manage to travel without knowing basic information! I still did some touring in the rain cutting it short when I got caught in a gale halfway up a volcano. I visited one of only two sandy beaches on the island but I had to make a run for it to get to the beach in this weather. See, there are very few dangers on the island. There´s no crime - where would the criminals go? There are very few weapons - it´s hard to import one from Chile. People don´t speed - most of the roads are dirt so if you value your internal organs you drive slowly. There is however one danger on the island that could be deadly and that I needed to avoid today. That danger is...death by falling coconut! Apparently it´s a real problem and with the wind today and the trail to the beach lined with trees it could have been ugly!

I also got to see the quarry where they carved the moai. Yesterday I saw the one where they carved their red hats. It´s amazing because it´s like they just shut the door one day and stopped making the moai. Some are finished and were never moved. Some are only outlines in the mountain side that were never finished. It´s pretty cool to look at even if I was about to get blown off the side of the mountain. After that we gave up and headed to the artisans market where for a price you can get a moai put on anything. Since everything is imported from the mainland it´s pretty pricey and I kept thinking that I saw the same stuff in the Santiago airport for half the price. I should have bought it there!

Tomorrow´s my last day on the island before a long day flying back on Thursday (totally not looking forward to that!) I´ve got a lot to still see, a Polynesian show and dinner and some shopping to do before the ultimate game of Tetris - figuring out how to get all of my stuff into my suitcase for the trip home.