Homeward Bound...

And so, our time on Rapa Nui has come to an end. In fact, so has this entire trip, to Chile, the southern tip of Argentina, the Antractic Pensinsula, the Orkneys, South Georgia and the Falklands too. Experientially, this must have been our best ever holiday. Nowhere else have we been so astounded, and seen so much that is new.

This map, by Eric Gaba (see citation below), had red spots to show the sites we visited. It also shows the approximate location of our Explora Hotel.

Fruit in the bowl at Explora.

Rapa Nui wildflowers.

Getting back to Rapa Nui, our fabulous guide, Ata, dwelled on the past, as he was probably paid and expected to do, and didn't show us much of the current Rapa Nui. In retrospect, we should probably have spent another day on Rapa Nui - the Explora Hotel was certainly pleasant enough! - so we could walk around the town of Hanga Roa and visit the marina, to see what present day Rapa Nui is like, and also to relax a bit and better enjoy the hotel facilities!

Cooling off in the Explora infinity pool, after a hot day on the road with Ata.

Is there anywhere else in the world that is more remote than Rapa Nui, or whose history is so interesting but shrouded in mystery? For these reason alone, this little volcanic island is worth a visit. We are very pleased to understabd that the restoration projects undertaken by William Mulloy and Claudio Cristino and others from 1955 have reawakened the Rapa Nui population's self-esteem and pride in their vital contribution to Polynesian history, and, apparently, transformed the island and its place in the world.

This reinvention seems to have led to the annual Tapati Festival, organised "by locals for locals", as a celebration of Rapa Nui's past. We just missed this Festival - it was held from 29Jan - 14Feb 2016, finishing barely a day or two before our arrival. The Festival, which would be wonderful to see, consists of a variety of locally relevant traditional events such as Haka Pei, where contestants slide down a steep hill at treacherous speeds, 80km/hr, on banana trunks. There is horse racing (apparently the gaucho style of riding from South America is popular), a triathlon (run, swim, canoe), and dance competitions. For Tapati, the populace splits into two clans representing the divisions of the original Polynesian arrivals. Fortunately, the destructive competition between clans of the past is replaced by peaceful endeavours which must, for Rapa Nui, be akin to nation building.

Two posters seen at the Explora. The '94 poster may be a reference to a movie that year. The other poster is for the annual Tapati cultural festival, organised "by locals for locals".

Promotional material for the 2016 Tapati Festival. Bare feet - it looks like a tough event.

And our visit causes us to reflect on the anthropogenic environmental disaster that caused Rapa Nui society to fail in the mid 1700's. Irrational competition to produce ever-larger mo'ai so diminished resources on Rapa Nui destroyed tree species to the extent that the natives could not build canoes for fishing. The absence of trees degraded the topsoil and farming failed. The island could not sustain itself. Overpopulation was the result and led to isurrection and clan wars, mo'ai were toppled in huri mo'ai, and the population was reduced to a fraction. Is this behaviour any different to what is happening in our society today, where city developers seem to prevail over saner heads seeking less growth and sustainable solutions? Where never-ending growth is the target regardless of a finite planet? Where money rules over science? What have we learned? Are we any better?

View over Hanga Roa and Mataveri airport. The airport was improved by NASA so it could be available for possible Pacific rescue missions from its space program.

Getting the windows cleaned at our Santiago hotel on our last day in Chile.

Back to Santiago, then the Qantas QF28 flight home presumably followed a Great Circle from Santiago (SCL) to Sydney (SYD) to minimise the distance flown. This route sent us way down south towards Antarctica, and south of New Zealand, as confirmed by the Flight Map on the plane's entertainment system when viewed at various times. We never saw Antarctica from the window because, apart from trying to sleep, we were probably a bit too far north and it was very cloudy anyway.

Spectacular view of Chilean volcano from QF28 as we headed south on the great circle route to Sydney.

The great circle route from Santiago to Sydney goes well south!

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Rapa Nui map By Eric Gaba (Sting), translated by Bamse - Own work. Shorelines, ponds, roads, trails and airport drawn using Landsat 7 ETM+ imagery (public domain);Topography: NASA Shuttle Radar Topography Mission (SRTM3v2) (public domain);Main references used for the toponymy:prof. William Mulloy's map (easier to read here);Pacific Island Travel map (http://www.pacificislandtravel.com/easter_island/about_destin/isla_de_pascua[1].jpg);[1], CC BY-SA 2.5, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=2940588

Off to Easter Island...

Six of us from the Orion took the Lindblad extension package to Easter Island. The Holiday Inn Express at the airport would not store baggage for non-returning guests for over 24 hours (some restrictive trade agreement with the airport), so the Lindblad representative assisted by taking us to the Left Luggage office at Sandiago airport - we didn't want to take all our cold weather gear to tropical Easter Island!

The flight to Easter Island (SCL - IPC) was an almost 5 hour epic on a brand new LAN 787-9 Dreamliner - these are wonderful new airliners compared to the clunky old Boeing Jumbos that Qantas seem to rely on. If we had realised how long this flight was, and in the general direction of Australia, we might have considered an alternate route home, from Easter Island, to Papeete and then Sydney. That would've saved 10 hours extra flying time, nothing to be sneezed at, and we might even have managed a holiday in Tahiti! But, we didn't think of that when we planned this trip and made the flight bookings.

This is the flight path we could/should have taken home, but instead, our bookings have us returning to Santiago.

Easter Island has an amazing story to tell. Firstly, it is the most remote inhabited island in the world, being over 2000km from Pitcairn Island. It is a special territory of Chile, and since 1995, has been named as a UNESCO World Heritage site thanks to its famous and mysterious statues, known as mo'ai or ma'oi, built by the Rapa Nui people and tall, averaging about 4m high. The island is quite small, 164sq.km and has a current poulation of 6-7,000.

The airport runway near the south west corner of Rapa Nui conveys the scale of this island.

Lindblad didn't send an expedition specialist with us, but recruited a local guide, Ata, a well educated and extremely knowledgeable guy with part Italian heritage. We were to learn from Ata, and by our own reading, that almost everything about Easter Island's history is hotly contested, and sometimes mythology seems more dominant than demonstrable facts. We don't know of any peoples whose past is so uncertain! The trouble is, the inhabitants left little in the way of written records - petroglyphs are mostly spiritual. Oral story-telling traditions seem to be poor and variously aid or conflict with carbon dating and scientific research.

Ata's father is Claudio Cristino, an archaeologist from the University of Chile and a co-founder of the Easter Island and Oceania Studies Centre. He has worked on the restoration of Rapa Nui sites. Ata said he didn't follow his father's footsteps in academia, but by doing this job, he is clearly doing his bit to propagate Rapa Nui's fascinating history to the world. Claudio is listed on Lindblad's website as a staff Cultural Specialist. Ata comes with a good pedigree!

The island we call Easter Island has many names. The Easter name was given by Dutch explorer Jacob Roggeveen when he arrived here on Easter Sunday, 1722. Our flight didn't come to Easter Island though, the official destination was the Spanish version Isla de Pascua, and Mataveri Airport's code is IPC . The local population call the island Rapa Nui, which means "Big Rapa", after, apparently, its resemblance to the smaller island of Rapa further west in the Pacific Ocean. But that's not the end of its names - there is Te pito o te kainga a Hau Maka which may mean "this little piece of land of Hau Maka, but the word "pito" also translates as "navel" which leads to an alternate meaning, "the Navel of the World". Such ambiguities are just the beginning on this island which we will respectfully refer to as Rapa Nui in posts to this blog.

Between the years 700 and 1100, Polynesian people first came to Rapa Nui from the Gambier Islands (2,600km away) and the Marquesas Islands (3,200km) in catamarans and canoes - these guys were no mean sailors! - and on these flimsy vessels they carried all the means to extend their traditional islander civilisations. The popularity of sweet potatoes (a South American vegetable) amongst Polynesians suggests that at least some migration to here (and other islands) came from the east.

Regardless, Ata explained to us that the arriving peoples brought Polynesian traditions with them, but were determined to shape and vary them in particular ways. This is no doubt true, and explains differing Polynesian cultures in all their locations. Several clans arrived here. The big mystery on Rapa Nui is why the clans here developed idolatory to a ridiculous extent and competition between them brought about their own destruction. Ata set about telling us this story, but it proved to be hard to separate fact from myth!

Ahu Tahai

Our first exposure to all of this was Ahu Tahai in the Rapa Nui National Park, quite near Hanga Roa, the only town on the island. All the mo'ai in Rapa Nui were destroyed in a crisis about which were are yet to learn, but Tahai (and other sites) had been restored by an American archaeologist, the late Dr. William Mulloy in 1972. The site has a number of erect mo'ai, all facing away from the sea, including five on a single altar, an ahu. UNESCO has apparently directed that most sites be NOT restored, but be left as they were found.

Mo'ai rest on altars, known as ahu.

Mulloy re-erected five mo'ai on their ahu here at Tahai, but most are in poor shape. Neck breaks have been visibly repaired.

We learned a lot on this first visit. The mo'ai, Easter Island Heads, are statues of men in which the head is disproprtionately large compared to the body, and don't have legs. This constant theme is no doubt symbolic, and maybe partly due to practical reasons. They (mostly) all face inland, supposedly guarding clan lands. The statues are made from blackish soft volcanic ash (tuff), but their heads are topped with a different material, a reddish coloured rock called scoria. Almost all mo'ai now have empty eye sockets, but one at Tahai has had its eyes restored - these are made from obsidian, and have particular sacred powers.

A restored mo'ai, complete with scoria hat and obsidian eyes.

A memorial to Mulloy at Tahai acknowledges his contribution to Rapa Nui. In part it says "by restoring the past of his beloved island, he also changed its future". Ata explained the truth of this statement, how the restoration has delivered pride and self esteem to the Rapa Nui population.

A raging surf rolls in on the north-east coast of Rapa Nui at Tahai.

There's a very small rocky beach at Tahai, enjoyed by a few sunbakers and determined swimmers. This area looks like a sort of port.

Ata taught us that carving, moving and erecting the mo'ai depleted the resources of Rapa Nui, a situation which got worse as apparent competition between the clans caused the mo'ai to get bigger and bigger. The fact that the mo'ai were all destroyed later in some crisis suggests that the people identified and protested against this folly, but were apparently powerless to influence the leadership, the Rapa Nui royalty. It seems that the powerful were far more concerned with death, and possibly the afterlife, than in sustaining the living!

Most mo'ai were pushed over and broken during a crisis.

Ata showing us the foundations of canoe shaped shelter at Tahai. It would have been used for sleeping and storage, but cooking and living would be outside. The tiny entrance at the right.

Southward Bound...

The time came to put ourselves in the hands of the company operating our Antarctic cruise, Lindblad / National Geographic. We moved from the Hilton to the Ritz Carlton Hotel, only about 1km away in Las Condes. We actually walked from one to the other, in wonderful sunshine. The Ritz trades too heavily on its brand name, we think. The digs are classier and more expensive, but the Hilton seems to be a better hotel.

Lindblad hosted a welcoming reception, and transported us to the airport for a chartered LAN flight to Ushuaia in Argentina. Yet another reciprocity fee to enter Argentina, but we had pre-paid it in this case, over the internet. Customs was appallingly slow at what looks like a very new Ushuaia airport terminal, but eventually we were all loaded onto buses for a drive through the Tierra del Fuego National Park.

A glimpse of remotest Tierra del Fuego as our charter flight approaches Ushuaia.

Under leaden skies, welcome to Ushuaia on the road in from the airport.

Our bus at the entrance to Tierra del Fuego National Park, as Tammy negotiates the entrance fee.

This park, which shares a border with Chile, marks the very southern end of the Pan-America Highway, only 18,000km to Alaska. According to our guide, Tammy, this is quite a popular road trip. The park itself was reasonably busy with walkers and campers - it is summer, which must be peak season in this remote place at the end of the world. Tammy taught us how to pronounce the town's name. The "h" is virtually silent - oos-why-uh. The weather was surprisingly mild, about 10C, overcast and a slight breeze. The park looked very dry and dusty, as if it hasn't seen good rain for some time.

The southern end of the Pan-American Highway.

Wildflowers and sphagnum moss at the edge of the Beagle Channel.

From Lake Lapataia at the end of the road, we took a catamaran along part of the infamous Beagle Passage back to Ushuaia. This is the route, we think, taken by Charles Darwin and The Beagle on the voyage around Cape Horn to the Galapagos Islands. Nice scenery, snow capped mountains, cruise ship activity, recreational kayaking and bird rookeries plus bird-watching tours were all evident on this little trip.

Unknown ship cruising west on the Beagle Channel.

These people must have kayaked some distance to get here.

A newer version of the Faro lighthouse at Ushuaia.

The catamaran dropped us back at Ushuaia which is a surprisingly large town. Tammy had explained that it has a population of about 70,000 encouraged by the government which offers a tax free environment - no income tax, no GST. Being the starting point for most Antarctic cruises adds to the town's busy-ness at this time of the year, and the small harbour certainly was evidence of that!

High density living for the King Cormorants on this rocky outcrop.

Looking across Ushuaia Harbour into town.

Arrival in South America...

We are in Santiago because our Antarctic cruise company wants us here! It's our first visit to Chile, and Santiago is a convenient destination because Qantas flies here directly from Sydney.

Magnificent interior of the huge Santiago Cathedral

One of the prettiest buildings in Santiago, seems to have been rebirthed for some other purpose.

Blue skies and a modern backdrop behind this church near Santa Lucia

Chile imposes an extremely annoying Reciprocity Fee on arrival. We paid it on entry in US$ but it amounts to about AUD300 for the two of us. Why is it annoying? Because only Mexicans and Australians are required to pay the fee and we imagine that it is required because the visa for Chileans visiting Australia must cost about that much. It is after all a reciprocity fee! No country wanting to encourage tourism, including Australia, should charge anything more than a very nominal amount for a visa.

Central Station in Santiago was designed in steel by none other than Gustav Eiffel!

According to the guff we have read, Santiago was founded in 1541 and is the capital of what must be the longest & skinniest country in the world. Its population is over 6 million (the whole country, 18 million), but it doesn't give the impression of being such a big city. High rise is modest, most of it in the Las Condes region. There may be huge surburban areas that we're unaware of and the density is probably greater than we realise. The skyline in all directions (except to the west coast) is mountainous, but even in our short time here, the nearby Andes are often obsured by summer smog or soggy clouds. The sight of them, snowcapped, in clear winter air must be spectacular.

In this Pedro Lira painting, the founding of Santiago takes place atop Santa Lucia Hill

The Spanish conquered the Amerindian natives of Chile in the 1500. Apparently, the peace-loving northern and central Incas were easily defeated, but the southern Mapuche tribes offered much more resistance. Because of the extra distance, the massive immigration which later transformed Argentina and Paraguay was much less on the west coast. That said, recent census reveal that 52% of Chileans are European, 44% Amerindian and 4% African ethnicity. Chile declared its independence from Spain in 1818.

The spectacular and modern arts centre, Centro Gabriela Mistral, provides shaded space for relaxation and socialising

The 30km taxi ride in from the airport was along excellent freeways, and included, we think, the 1.8km San Cristobal tunnel, a major engineering achievement, which opened in 2009. Some of the route followed the fast flowing and very brown Rio Mapocho, and we saw lots of shanty towns which no doubt account for much of the city's population, and remind us that poverty is a common blight in South America.

Santiago is a bustling city. The historical old city, which centres on the Plaza de Armas, literally buzzes with pedestrian crowds of office workers and other locals. There are tourists, but not many, and most are Speakers, by the sound of it. Cars are mostly excluded from this area, enhancing its attractiveness immensely. Magnificent buildings, dateing from the 1800's, are everywhere, and those in bad repair are getting expensive looking makeovers. Weekends, and Sundays in particular, are a different proposition altogether. All the street shops are closed, the crowds largely disappear, and the whole ambience begins to resemble a rundown area of Detroit. Museums are open though (they close Mondays) to give the residents some culture to absorb. Also open exceptionally, and very crowded, are the large ultra-modern shopping complexes, like Costanera, near our hotel. These new developments must be giving street shops a bad time.

Santiago is laced with lovely covered shopping arcades.

New and old are frequently juxtaposed in Santiago downtown.

Street performers extract tips from photographers near Santa Lucia.

The Cafe Mosqueto is really popular with office workers at lunchtimes.

Our French must be better than we realise, because it no problem for us to read the language and converse in basic restaurant language in French speaking countries. Here in this Spanish speaking country, it is very different - signage is often hard to decipher, and we cannot understand or make ourselves understood with non-English speakers. We acknowledge that this is our problem, not theirs, but the difference is quite notable to us. There are not that many tourists here, and many locals are clearly as monolingual as we are. They try hard, and are very friendly and helpful, but it's sometimes quite a battle.

Opera makes for popular busking in Plaza de Armas.

Low level security presence in the Plaza de Armas.

A magnificant classical building houses the Tribunales de Justica

The National Congress overlooks a modern & spacious plaza.

Carabinieri escorting a VIP from the National Congress

We bought BIP cards (similar to Opal cards) and loaded them with Pesos so we could use Santiago's subway and buses. Give our non-existent Spanish, this process was mainly hit and miss and involved hastily handwritten notes and demonstrations on a calculator. We probably spent more Peso than we needed, but in the end, we concluded a transaction with the patient Transantiago lady. And the BIPs work fine, as does the clean, efficient and crowded Santiago underground metro system which we made good use of.

Neuva York is a gated pedestrian walk serviced by a line-up of shoe shine barrows.

Magazine kiosk in the Ahumada shopping mall.

Stand-up espresso at Cafe Haiti is the way to go for a caffeine hit.

You have to be careful ordering capuccino, or, too much milk and cream may arrive!

We became prey but not victims of thieves on our very first full day in Santiago. Someone squirts a vile bird-dropping substitute over you from behind, points it out, then offers to assist you with clean water. They then rob you when you let go your belongings. We know about this scam and were on to it straight away - we told them (a couple working in tandem) to go away, firmly and quickly. They were persistent and kept coming back to point out the mess on both of us, but we only survived unscathed by rejecting their advances and not ever putting anything down. We had wet-ones to do our own clean up, and the damage does not appear to be permanent. Other than that incident, we feel quite safe in Santiago. A heavy security presence is evident everywhere we went.

The Museo de Bellas Artes is a magnifient building in the Parque Forestal of Santiago

Is it David in the Museo de Bella Artes?

Cubano Mohitos hit the spot at the end of a hot afternoon

We spent all our free time wandering around the streets of Santiago, using the metro to get between major villages and back to our hotel. The photos show what we saw. One large highlight which we stumbled upon because it didn't even feature in our pre-reading for Santiago was Santa Lucia Hill, and the fortifications and Castillo Hidalgo on top. This rocky outcrop, an old volcano apparently, commands fabulous views of the city and is involved in much of its history.

One of many piazas near Castillo Hidalgo on Santa Lucia Hill

View towards the modern city of Las Condes from Castillo Hidalgo

It's a steep climb to the uppermost lookout, an ex fort, on Santa Lucia Hill

View of Santiago and the Andes from Santa Lucia Hill

From atop Santa Lucia Hill

The Santa Lucia Hill top lookout was packed with visitors taking selfies, but this one was actually capturing the view.

Canon near Castillo Hidalgo

Few locks but much graffiti to document your love on Santa Lucia Hill.

Outhanging lookout posts in this hilltop fort remind of similar in Old San Juan

Spectacular terrace dedicated to King Neptune in Santiago

Our hotel in Santiago is the Hilton Doubletree in Av. Vitacura in Las Condes. It's ultra-modern and is still having some teething problems, but our room is spacious and very comfortable. It's within 2 minutes walk of the huge Costanera shopping mall, and 5 minutes from the Tobalaba metro station.

An Andes peak and a vertical garden catch the eye looking up Av Vitacura in Las Condes

After sunset from hotel window in Las Condes, the pedestrian bridge simplifying access to the Costanera shops.

Santiago is in an earthquake zone, and indeed we felt a brief but strong tremor whilst on the 13th floor of the Hilton. The hotel assures us that the new building is constructed to the highest standards, and indeed, while some guests were disturbed, no alarms were set off.