Just to go back a step to Day Three Part 2. This is an aerial view of the crater where they do the Easter Island triathlon. It is such a good example of a collapsed volcano crater, I thought that I would put it in.Also back up to the Navel of the World and associated moai.
This fallen moai is the biggest one ever known to have been erected.
It is also at Ahu Te Pito Kura, and named "Paro".
I have actually been selling you all short on moai stats.
Paro is 32.63 feet (9.80 meters) tall and weighs approximately 82 tons (74.39 metric tons).
Quite a bit more than the 30 tons I have been wobbling on about.
So to set the record straight:
* Total number of moai on Easter Island: 887
* Total number of moai that were successfully transported to their final ahu locations:
288 (32% of 887)
* Total number of moai still in the Rano Raraku quarry: 397 (45%)
* Total number of moai lying 'in transit' outside of the Rano Raraku quarry: 92 (10%)
* Largest moai:
Location: Rano Raraku Quarry, named "El Gigante"
Height: 71.93 feet, (21.60 meters)
Weight: approximately 145-165 tons (160-182 metric tons)
* Largest moai once erect:
Location: Ahu Te Pito Kura, Named "Paro"
Height: 32.63 feet (9.80 meters)
Weight: approximately 82 tons (74.39 metric tons)
* Largest moai fallen while being erected:
Location: Ahu Hanga Te Tenga
Height: 33.10 feet (9.94 meters)
* Smallest standing moai:
Location: Poike
Height: 3.76 feet (1.13 meters)
So there!
Last stop and last moai coming up at Anakena Beach.
Anakena beach is the only sandy beach on the island.
In the aerial view, the sea is the bluey greeny bit in the top left hand corner. The sand is the sand coloured bit. Green splodges are where the palm trees are. The thingy that looks like a broken banjo at the bottom of the shot, just above the writing, is an ahu with seven moai, well five and two halves moai really, as you will see. There is also another ahu sort of due up from the broken end of the banjo, only one moai but it seems to have two heads.
Just off the shot to the left is the Anakena Beach Commercial Centre. If you have been you know what I am talking about. I had two glasses of chilled chirimoya juice cos it was flipping hot and very nice they were too.
Anakena seems to have the whole of the island in essence. Sunshine, blue sea, golden sand, ahu, moai, palm trees etc.
Quite idyllic.
These are the 5 and 2 half moai but with four cracking top knots. ('Pukao'. Remember?)
Nice ahu.
Even a petroglyph or two
Good Innit?
This is the smaller moai.
A bit Siamese Twinsy. No doubt there is a significance to this but I don't know what it is.
The other interesting thing about this moai is that it was erected by none other than Thor Heyerdahl of 'Kon Tiki' fame.
Probably not single handed. And with ropes, rollers and piles of stones and stuff.
He, apparently was desperate to put one up to prove his theory about how it was done.
You can see his point. Having just floated in from Peru on a balsa log raft to demonstrate his theory that the Rapa Nui people came from South America AND found the one ahu (the only one out of dozens) on the island resembling South American masonry, he must have been well chuffed so putting up a moai would have been the cherry on his cake.
So he pestered and pestered and eventually he was given permission to put up old two heads here.
I wonder if the elders thought
'Oh give him the deformed one to play with. It won't matter if he breaks it'.
But he didn't. And, fair play, he made a decent job of it.
Pity DNA testing has shown that the Rapa Nui came from Pacific Polynesia but it was still a hell of a float from Peru to Rapa Nui on an old bunch of logs.
'Chapeau' to Thor then.
Well, that's about it really for the old Rapa Nui Experience. I loved every minute of it from touching down to taking off again. And to cap it all, there was a beautiful sunset to eat my dinner in front of on my last night
Yes. It really did look like this!
