Leaving Easter Island

I suspect that there are few high-techology places left in the world that are not only barefoot-friendly, but in which you will actually see other barefoot people on a regular basis. But that’s Easter Island.

Eventually it was time to go, so here are a few wrap-up pictures.

It was actually hard for me to come up with a term for what I want to describe. I certainly didn’t want to use terms like “First World” and “Third World”, even even more certainly didn’t want to say “civilized” and “uncivilized”. We’re all civilized. But it is in the higher-technology locations that shoes have become ubiquitous.

(I also probably shouldn’t omit other places in Polynesia, like Tahiti, or even New Zealand, and then there also Australia.)

But at least bare feet haven’t been totally forgotten, even if they are no longer mainstream the way they were.

Anyways, this blog entry is a bit of a wrap-up, with a few odds-and-ends pictures from a few other locations we visited on the island, followed by our departure to Puerto Montt, Chile.

Here’s another picture at Orongo, taken by Lucas Alvarado (Machi’s son). I just like it because you can see the blow-out part of the rim, right next to Orongo itself in the background to the right.

More Orongo

Lucas also got a shot of me at Tongariki.

Tongariki Meditation

There are other prominent ahus and moais on the island to visit. One such location is Ahu Akivi. Here are Machi and his wife in front of the seven moai there.

Machi and Virginia at Ahu Akivi

The moai all face directly west (as far as we can tell within reasonable accuracy). This is noted in all the literature as facing sunset at the Spring Equinox, but that is west everywhere on the globe.

However, this is the only place on the island where the moai are oriented to a geographical/astronomical feature.

Another place that is well-visited is Tahai. The moai Ko Te Riku has restored eyes.

Tahai with the Eye

It’s always hard to get a decent picture of this. In the afternoon, you’re shooting right into the sun. In the morning, the better time, the sky in the background still tends to wash out the features.

For the longest time archeologists didn’t realize that the moai had eyes. They just had the deep eyeholes, and folks just thought, “Wow, those are weird eyes”. But then some eyes themselves were found (made out of coral, and with the same red scoria that the topknots were made of). This is the only moai restored with the eyes (though the restored eyes are white concrete, not coral).

There is also a boat ramp (so to speak) there, which allowed me to get this shot from the side.

Ko Te Riku

And then, let’s have one more shot with me in the picture.

Contemplating . . .

I mentioned in Haere Va’e that there were surfing lessons for the younger Rapanui taking place outside the Pea Restaurant. Here they are.

Surfing Lesson

The kids looked like they were maybe 10 years old.

And then it was time to go. Here’s a shot back at the peninsula containing Rano Kau and Orongo taken from our airplane as it took off.

Looking Back

(Orongo and the caldera are out-of-shot to the right.) Those cliffs are pretty-much typical for the island.

By the way, the runway for Mataveri Airport on Easter Island is incredibly long, nearly 2 miles. It just barely fits across the neck leading to Orongo. It’s that long because it was improved so that space shuttles could land there in a emergency.

It’s so long that when our plane left the terminal, it didn’t bother even taxiing to the end of the runway. It hit the runway and just started to take off from there.

And finally, here are the three of us in the airport just before boarding.

In the Mataveri Lounge

Easter Island was enhanced by just a bit more bare feet than usual during our visit. I really didn’t have any other problems going barefoot there. The bricks got a little hot during late afternoon, but nothing I couldn’t handle. Near the shore in some places the rocks were a bit gravelly, but just by watching my steps at bit, it was easy to avoid the worst of it. Aside from the awesomeness of being on Rapa Nui, being completely barefoot just added to the spiritual karma and mana of the place.

From there we flew to Santiago, and then down to Puerto Montt, where Machi lives. As I said before, it was wonderful simply not to worry about flying barefooted. There were no concerns that anybody might deny us boarding . . . and they didn’t.