Easter Island

It’s the morning of the flight to Bolivia. We’re getting a car at 8:50 and I woke up there before my alarm so I’m filling this in before I forget. Yesterday we went up the West coast, North of Vina and Valpo. Dad and I met for breakfast and I brought him for a coffee with legs before getting the metro to Pajaritos and a bus to Vina. From there it took a while to figure out how to get to Zapallar, a coastal resort town. We eventually found a bus going there from the plaza in Vina.

It took ages to get there. There’s three towns strung along the coast right next to each other so we were going to go to the furthest one but to save time and cut down on the journey back we got off at Zapallar, the one in the middle. There was nothing going on there, a serious ghost town. It was around three or four when we got there and we hadn’t had lunch so we searched around for an open restaurant and found one serving my least favourite meal. Chicken Cazuela or chicken leg in oily water with potato. At least the chips were decent.

I was thinking we should head towards Santiago then straight away so we wouldn’t be flagging down a bus in the dark but the sun came out so Dad of course had to take some photos of the beach as it went down. I sat on some steps listening to my iPod stressing about the bus until dark.

We did manage to get the bus after about twenty minutes but it was so full Dad was getting squished by the door when it closed. It was actually the same driver that had dropped us off but he wasn’t as happy to see me as I was to see him. Then at the next stop I was destroyed by the door.

We got to Valpo quick enough as the driver didn’t stop everywhere and when we got to the station there was bus leaving straight away for Santiago. When we got back I took us to a Catalan restaurant in Bellas Artes. I asked the waiter what was the best so he recommended something off the menu and we both got it and pulpo (octopus) as a starter. The octopus was really good but the special meat dish was a four weird chunks of meat on the bone that we couldn’t identify. And one of the beers I got was half frozen so it was like drinking a slushie. Dee lish.

Going to Easter Island we had to get a taxi at 5 to be at the airport 3 hours before our 8:50 flight. Dad got semi lost finding my house so I had to guide him in while I was trying to get the driver to chill out. We both slept in the airport and I was out before take off so I wasn’t too tired then when we arrived.

Easter Island itself was crazy. It was really undeveloped and then there are statues everywhere. Most were ripped down in tribal warfare and the ones that were restored resulted in curses for the islanders involved. We saw houses as well and they were the most uncomfortable looking dwellings ever. The islanders aren’t that tall and to get in to some gaffs you had to wriggle in on your belly.

The first day we went on tour with Alvaro senior from the hotel. He was very impressed with Dad’s camera and the fact that we were Catholic so he threatened to bring us to mass the next day but thankfully that didn’t work out. Alvaro junior brought us out the next day with three mental Chilenas. They were a good laugh though and they were constantly taking the piss out of Alvaro. He told Dad and I that he was descended from the former king and that his grandad was mayor and that he himself had worked with Thor Heyerdahl to erect some statues but I couldn’t help thinking that that was exactly what I would say if I was a tour guide.

We went to a load more shrines that second day and to where the statues were hacked out of the mountain. The used stone tools to carve stone statues. It took a year to make one and then it was put in a hole until it was needed. They had a conveyor belt system and there were several moai (statues) on there way out from the mountain towards the rest of the island but they never reached there destination. Some of the moai were broken as they were rolled down the hill. Imagine how frustrated you would be spending a year carving a stone effigy of some rich prick only to see it snapped in two minutes after you finished it. Jesus I’d be going crazy.

For dinner we got seafood both nights. There was a good collection of restaurants near our gaff so we got mahi mahi and some other tropical fish for lunch Saturday, then a meat and fish plate that night. Brent (Who I met through Laurie) and his girlfriend showed up and sat next to us so we shared our starter as they were starving. The starter came out after the main so we had way too much food anyhow.

Being on Easter Island really reminded me of Lost. It’s the most remote island in the world and the cultures they had there were crazy but it’s probably the most amazing place that I’ve ever been (apart from Galway obviously). And now I’m off to Bolivia. I got an Facebook saying to go to the famous San Pedro Prison in La Paz that Aoife read a book about. We’ll have to have  a look but it sounds well dodgey.