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Easter Island, Chile – Part 2 (Post #103)

Wednesday, April 5th, 2006

Mike writes…

After a great full-day tour with our guide Elizabeth on Saturday, we thought we would see some of the other sites on our own Sunday. After our great breakfast at the Tekena Residencial late sunday morning, we set on a hike along the coast towards the volcano at Orongo about 5km east of the Hanga Roa village. A pamphlet provided by the tourist office in town guided us through several signposted sights along the way including the airport which has a 5km long runway. Originally, the runway was much shorter however at some point the U.S. convinced the Easter Islanders to lengthen it to accommodate the Space Shuttle in case of an emergency landing.

Though there are not many trees on Easter Island, along the base of the volcano, we passed through a forest of introduced trees including Eucalyptus and Cypress. We really enjoyed our hike which, at times, reminded us of a 50mile run we did to Mt. Hood along the PCT in Oregon, U.S. Here is a photo we took from a spot shortly after the forest of introduced trees. About mid-photo it is possible to see the town of Hanga Roa (the only one on the island).

[read on]

Easter Island, Chile – Part 1 (Post #102)

Wednesday, April 5th, 2006

Buenos Dias! Michele aqui (here)…

Today is April 5 and we have been traveling for 303 days!

We are in one of the most remote places on earth and also one of our favorite destinations on our around-the-world trip – Easter Island, Chile. We are currently only 1 hour behind East Coast time in the U.S. but it took days to get here. To back up a bit…

We left Picton, New Zealand on March 27th and drove to Christchurch. The drive was stunning since the road follows the coast, but like almost every day we experienced in New Zealand, it was cloudy and raining. We stopped in Kaikora, a coastal town, where we filled the car up with gas, got some lunch, and visited a seal colony. A sign on one of the shop doors read, “Missing: The Sun. If found, please return to Kaikora”. We arrived in Christchurch and found we had been upgraded to a flat (apartment) at our hostel. Our little apartment was very nice and for $35/night, it was a steal! We spent two days in Christchurch, which has a very England feel to it. We did walk around the downtown area and take some pictures but yep, it was cloudy and raining, so we mainly focused on running errands.

[read on]