Meeting the Moai

Hey Everybody!

First of all, I apologize....at some point I started spelling Moai as Moab. That is wrong & the statues asked me to correct the error. How could anyone say no to those guys :-).

After more than 24hrs in-transit (including sleeping on a tile floor at Santiago's International Airport) due to some unknown system failure about 40min out of Santiago that required us to turn back & start over a few hours later....I have arrived on Easter Island!

I won't have a formal tour here until Tuesday. The owner (actually owner's son) speaks fluent English and his family is from here. His grandfather has a street named after him & he coordinated the effort to repair (stand up) Moai several decades ago. Anyway, I head out to see what I could find on my own.... didn't take long to find water or statues.

While I do have some wifi access....it isn't so good with photo uploads. But are a few. My first sunset with a Moai.

Although I was quite tired Sunday morning and wanted to sleep in I could not do it! I had only one Sunday on the island and was told that attending the Catholic Church service is a must for the music. I only understood one or two Spanish words out of ten & certainly didn't understood the Polynesian music, but it was SO beautiful! If you are ever on this island, you should really go. I could have listened to them all day. It is one of the things that makes this church unique - the Polynesian culture is incorporated. The priest wears a flower lei & has an unbelievably beautiful robe with shells sewn on it. The culture is also represented on the church's statues & on the building itself. I will take a better church pic before leaving, but wanted you to see it.

After church & a bite to eat I head out in a new direction with a few unexpected friends. The dog stayed with me for about 90min. The dogs here aren't wild, but they are quite free & often follow tourists. Some of horses here seem to be wild....not sure about this particular group. They didn't seem to mind the dog or me.

Finally....the Green Sea Turtles here are quite used to people. Local kids often ride the large adults. I've seen several turtles already, but there weren't any nearby when I was in the water. The turtles don't snap & I even saw them swim over to people.

The weather is great - light breeze, temps in 70s, and the Pacific is almost 70* so it's cool but tolerable. It's such a relaxed environment that I even took a bit of a siesta between my hike and my swim. I rented some snorkel gear this morning & hope to spend the afternoon in the water.

More soon...including some posts about Antarctica eventually! Thanks for stopping by!

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