Entries about carpe

We have set up two days of touring. As everyone on the island - tourists that is - all go to the same place, we've joined a group to tour the Moais. So we are the second pickup the first day and then drive around to many other hotels picking up one or two people or small groups. Shows us there are a lot of hotels around and a lot looking far more interesting than ours and in better locations although ours isn't terrible.

Finally we are away to the first site and when we get there, the driver turns off the engine and Helen, our tour guide, stands in the open doorway and delivers a small lecture on the place we are visiting, first in English and then in Spanish. I have no idea if this is true when someone is in a country where the main language is English and they are waiting for the translation in their language but when I am waiting for the English translation, it always seems like they speak for 4 or 5 minutes in Spanish (or French, or Hungarian, or whatever) and then about a minute, if we're lucky, in English. Not sure if every other language has to take more words to say the same thing or if the translators just don't know the same explanation in English. I can say that it was getting very hot in the bus while we waiting for her to finish. She did this at each stop, alternating between speaking Spanish first and then English first. I so wanted to just get out of the bus and stand in the shade. Have to say that my blood has thinned out from living in England and the heat drives me crazy now (says the lady who is going to retire in Florida!).

We are finally out of the bus and going to see our first Moais. How exciting. Each location we will visit is part of their National Park System so we have a ticket that must be shown to get past the barriers. My hubby is in charge of the tickets. In the two days, we visited the main sites of the main Moais and birdmen. There are other sites as the island is ringed with them. Most of the sites are in ruins but the ones that are so prevalent in photos and the largest ones have been reconstructed. they are all amazing. Should we ever get back there, we'll rent a car and get a map and just head out to the places on our own and hit all of them.

The Moais were burial sites for important people, usually the rich and usually the chiefs of a tribe or family. One Moai for one burial. Moais face inward, away from the sea, as the important people had power or manna and facing towards their village would help give the people protection. The first ones weren't very large and then they started getting bigger and bigger and taller and taller. There are many theories on how they moved the stones from the quarry to wherever it was place but the largest ones are still in the quarry, never having been finished or never having been moved. The eyes were the last part of the statue that was put in place - after it had been put on it's pedestal or in it's hole in the ground. Putting in the eyes would imbue the Moai with the spirit of the person who was buried at its feet or underneath it and start the protection.

The top knot - or the red stone on some of the Moais - had a separate quarry. This is not a hat. It is a hair style with many of the Rapa Nui still wear today. My dive master had long enough hair to do a top knot but mostly he wore his hair in a man bun. Not many statues have top knots, only a small proportion of then. These Moais and these top knots weigh tons.

Birdmen came later than the Moais and involved finding an egg. The birdman competition involved repelling over a steep cliff on the island and swimming out to the third islet from the mainland (maybe 1000 yards) Then the men must find the first egg of the sooty tern which traveled there in the spring. He then had to swim back to the mainland, climb back up the cliff, and present the egg to the village in which case he would be rewarded with being in charge and also getting 7 women to be his wives. The wives-to-be spent the month before the competition living in an underground cave so their skin would get whiter. During the competition, anything goes so you might have the egg but your competitors would be trying to steal it from you. Trying to steal the egg might include you getting brained on the head with a rock or cudgel. Contestants in this contest were risking life and limb just to physically handle the challenge, not to mention trying to keep their fellow competitors from killing them. This competition went on into modern times before it was phased out. Now they do re-enactments.

Some of the sites we visited were ruins, as I mentioned. some had the remnants of village longhouses, some had the giant heads toppled over and almost covered by the dirt and grass, and a few were just some stones remaining. Of course, the most impressive sites are the reconstructed ones where you had many Moais standing at attention and giving their protection to the land.

We visited the quarry for the stone heads and there are hundreds there. Some are still attached to the rock walls. Others are scattered haphazardly over the hills and some have fallen or have been prepared for being moved down the hill and never got any further. It was magnificent to walk among these giant heads.

Only one location, our last, had 7 Moais that look towards Polynesia in honor of the ancestors that came to Easter Island and settled. They are the only Moais that look away from the land and out to sea. And there are no burials under these 7 Moais because they were not for protection and not for the manna that they could give.

We also learned that there is no harbor on Easter Island. There is one beach which we visited but even there, you must be careful as the waves crash into shore. Container boats bringing cars, trucks, construction materias, etc. sit offshore until the wind and waves die down enough to send barges out to the ships to unload. The airport is the best way in and out of Easter Island and we noticed it has a very, very long runway. It was built also as an emergency runway for the Space Shuttle. So the island has interesting history and culture at every turn. I've abbreviated everything to cover a couple of days at once. As stated earlier in the blog, Easter Island was the reason for this trip and everything else was just added on gravy. Supposedly it is one of the most remote islands in the world so not cheap to get there but well worth the trip and so very glad we took it. Of course, we now have a small Moai at our house, facing inward for protection, although nothing is buried underneath it. Fantastic place - Easter Island.

How cool is that! Not something that I had planned but it just worked out that way. We had been driving back to Santiago for our flight, which is about 6 hours long, and gotten into Easter Island yesterday. Our guide took us for a short drive through Hanga Roa before taking us to our hotel which was one block up and across the street from the airport. Not the best of locations because it was a little over a mile into town - not that it was a large town but nothing but breakfast at our hotel.

We had one extra day on this trip and added it to Easter Island because I wanted to dive. There is a large Moai statue that has been sunk into the waters off Hanga Roa. No, it's not a real one but one made out of concrete and cement just to put in the water for the divers. So that was my purpose, to go see the underwater Moai. I had attempted to contact several diving companies on the island before hand and had never received a reply so I had my tour company set up the diving. There had been a lot of back and forths between us as she didn't want me to end up going with beginners and be bored but I don't like to swim so I didn't want to go with super advanced divers and have to swim a lot. So it was set up and my hubby, who is also a diver but on restriction at the moment, would get to go to the museum. I thought it would be a wash but in the end, he had a much better time than me.

I had not brought any of my dive gear with me because of weight issues with the airplanes and luggage. always a mistake as rental dive gear never works out well for me. I am dropped off at the dive shop where my divemaster is waiting, a small RapuNui man with hair in a top knot as is their tradition. He doesn't speak a whole lot of English but we can understand each other for the most part because we are talking diving. he is busy gathering gear for me. I had to try of a couple of wet suits to find one that fits and then while he is loading tanks into his truck, I am searching through the stacks for fins and a mask that will work. No snorkels anywhere and I always use a snorkel. Oh well. Usually I am very good on air consumption so shouldn't need to snorkel necessarily. Unfortunately, he did not stock dive lights though and I had brought my dive camera but not a light. That means I won't get any good photos. Bummer. No underwater Moai and no good photos.

He asks me how much weight I will need and I look in my dive log and tell him. He puts the weight in the truck. I am starting to put on the wet suit and he tells me to wait. I ask him where we will dive and say I want to see the Moai. He says no, and points at the sea which is bashing itself against the rocks where we are and says the Moai is right out there and cannot go out there today, too rough. well, I do agree with that but huge bummer. That was the reason I was diving!

Then it suddenly hit me that no one else was here so I asked him if I was the only diver - why yes I am. wow. personalized service for sure. So the truck is finally loaded with our gear and we hop in and he drives into town, around a couple of corners and pulls into a driveway and I'm looking all over for a boat and the water but we've come to a house. He hops out and goes and talks to the lady hanging clothes on the line and then back from the house and down to the main street of town. He is halfway down the street when he stops and talks to someone coming the other direction. I have no idea what he is doing. I do know he is not speaking Spanish. He and his friends are speaking their native tongue - RapaNui language.

We turn around and go back to the house were we had just left and pull into the driveway again. The man he was talking to on the street is there and pulling out a gas tank and putting it in the truck. Oh yes, well, fuel is definitely good. But then we go back to the main street and he pulls into a store that is open (remember, it is Easter Sunday) and comes out with bottled water and some cookies which I don't eat (only because I didn't like the kind he bought). Oh well, more for him. Then finally we are away to past the airport, past our hotel, past several places where I can see Moais in the distance, and finally we are on the other side of the island and pulling down a small dirt road to a small marina where there are four boats in a shelter from the waves. He backs up his truck to unload the gear and tanks (we have two tanks each). I start to put on my wet suit and again, he tells me to wait.

Of course, he goes over and gets the smallest boat from the line and brings it over to our side of the marina and starts loading it which includes putting in the gas tank and priming the engine and making sure it works. Now, I can put on my wet suit. All ready to go diving and we go putt putting out of the small marina and we are climbing the rollers. There are some big-ass waves out here but they are long waves so even though they are 4-5' tall, there is a large trough between each wave so we don't have a problem moving between them and we get far enough away from shore that it seems they are smaller. Easter Island does not have a reef so the waves just pound away at the shore all around the island. So the closer to shore, the closer the waves get to each other, I think. Not a wave dynamic person.

We are out far enough and my divemaster puts on his mask and upends himself over the side of the boat. If I were just to see him from a distance, would have though for sure he was barfing. In actuality, he was looking for where he wanted to anchor the boat. So he wasn't on the spot yet so he kept going a few feet and then look into the water again, another few feet, look again. Finally found his spot and dropped anchor and we got ready to dive. had to put on my weight belt first which is another reason why I prefer my gear as my weights are in my B.C. which I like better but oh well. I'm all ready to go and wait for him. Of course, it takes him about a minute to put on all his gear and then we do a back flip over the side and into the water. YIKES but it is cold. Then my wet suit warms up and I am OK. There is a bit of a current so I am hanging onto the boat. He comes around and we go to the anchor line and he makes the motion for descend.

041617122757 two outrigger kayakers

041617120858 view of backside of easter island from the sea

041617120706 view of backside of easter island from the sea

041617120652 waves crashing on shore

041617113800 Diving Easter Island fish

041617112554 lobster Diving Easter Island

041617110024 views of easter island from the boat

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Dang nab it. I told him how much weight I needed but he didn't believe me. I am quite fluffy and marshmallow like or cork like and bob up and down in the water really well. SO, of course, I didn't have enough weight and for once, the divemaster had not brought any extra weights with him so I was struggling a bit to get all the air out of my BC so I could descend. I was going to kip over and just dive because that will usually give me enough of a kick to get down and then the pressure helps but the divemaster came over and grabbed me by the hand and just dragged me down. Nice that such little people can be so strong!

We are down but I am getting battered about by the surge. We are down about 30' and there is still a surge. Divemaster motions to me to hold onto one of the large lava rocks there and he has to go move the anchor which is tangled in something. I am having to hold on with both hands to keep from being swept off by the surge. I did come back with some nice new huge bruises on my legs and arms. He comes back and motions me to follow and I'm really having a hard time doing that. Finally he grabs me by the hand and pulls me around this pile of rocks and deeper where the surge isn't quite as strong. We are deeper and he goes searching for some large rocks which he stuffs into my BC pockets. whew, now I am weighted enough to be able to control my buoyancy with putting air into and out of my B.C.

We swim around for awhile and there are some nice fish, a really nice lobster, and some trumpet fish and a few little fish but not a whole lot. No coral, no anemones, no sponges, just mostly rocks. Time to head back to the boat and he indicates I should follow. We have swam much further away from the boat that I would have liked and we are in a surge again. So I swim hard to stay in place then let the surge take me towards the boat. This is a lot of work and I hate to work at my diving. It takes us maybe 15 minutes to get close enough to the boat that I can see the anchor line. I go to it to do my 3 minutes safety stop and now we are in the waves so I am bounding up and down the line. There is a limit to where you are supposed to stay for your safety stop and I am barely managing to stay in it as the waves and surge are throwing me all over the place. My poor dive computer is shooting up into the yellow and almost red and then down again to safety level. Not enjoying this at all but our 3 minutes are finally up and I got up the line towards the boat.
Once on the surface, I have to be careful that the waves don't smack my head into the boat and there is not a ladder. Divemaster does the graceful lift up and over the edge and is in the boat. He quickly strips off his gear and then I start handing him mine, weights first, then tank and BC and fins and then he just hauls me over the edge like a landed floppy fish. so inglorious. I hate getting on a boat like this but I am on the boat and out of the surge and waves. I sit there and think for a few minutes and then tell him it is OK to go back to the marina as I am done diving. that wasn't really a whole lot of fun and we really didn't see a whole lot so one dive is good.

He starts the motor and stops several times on the way in to shore to look over the side again and says he sees some sharks. Where were they when we were underwater?? Then back to the shore where I am useless as every time I try to help him unload something he tells me no, I don't have to do it. wow. he does ask me to take off the wet suit and I think he wanted me to take off more so I didn't get his truck seat wet but there wasn't anyway to do that so I just sat on my towel.

As I am waiting while he unloads and packs up, three ocean outrigger kayaks turn up in the small marina from their morning paddle about in the ocean. And then we are ready to go back to town where he will drop me off at the hotel since we drive right by it. I know my husband will be back from his tour. So in the end, he had a much better morning than me and saw some good stuff. I did get to dive Easter Island but no Moai, bad photos, fighting seasickness, and lots of bruises. And yes, diving is worth it overall.

The entire time we were on Easter Island, it was rather windy, so windy that the container ships were sitting offshore waiting for the wind to abate before they could off load their shipments. When I talked to one of the other dive shops, they said no one was diving! yep, what I thought. It was really too windy and wavy to be out there diving but I did get to do it, just didn't like it much.

Our guide and driver fetched us this morning for a drive around Santiago and dropping off downtown to wander the streets and look at the buildings and such. Santiago is another capital city and we enjoyed being there but one day was enough for us. Our guide pointed out various parks and restaurants to us, as if we could remember them or how to get to them later. We walked through the main parts of the city, saw the Cathedral, map of the early city in bronze, some statues (both of heroes and modern art), the President's Palace, the museums, the juice sellers, the shoe shine men, bicycle rental, and shopping streets, and a protest. Towards the end of our tour, we were close to our hotel and she showed us how to get to the night life area. We'll go over there for dinner, we think. Then finally up the hill that overlooks the city and she turned us "loose" in the park to look at the plants. hmmm. a bit odd and off as we had 15 minutes to wander a whole park and look at it's botanical wonders. ah well. it was hot so not a problem.

Back to our hotel and goodbye to the guide and we set off immediately for some lunch. To get lunch, we walked back to the downtown area which wasn't far from us and then just wandered around for a bit. Touts were trying to entice people into small arcades and malls to get people to eat at their restaurants and it was lunchtime so some places had lines out the doors. We wandered into one small arcade and saw a small hole in the wall restaurant selling chicken and rice. They didn't speak a lick of English but just started serving us as it was a set meal. Might well have been one of the best meals we had on the entire trip and it was certainly one of the cheapest. If you don't die at "holes in the walls", then you will have excellent food.

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Then we went to the cultural museum which was quite good. Spent quite a bit of time in there wandering the floors and displays. I actually read most of the signs which most of the time, I'm sitting on the bench close to the exit of a room while my hubby reads all of the signs. Then back out on the street, past the Presidential Palace again, past the protest area but the protesters are gone, past the shoe shine men and to our hotel. We had used this place for a laundry stop and it had already been returned so packing up again for a short trip to Valparaiso tomorrow for a couple of days. Yep, too much travelling, not enough time in some places, too much time in others.

NOTE: for the photos. The dog photo is a street dogs of which they have many. Some group or several people go around the give the dogs coats to wear. not sure the dogs like them because it can get really hot there but there you have it. Street dogs with yellow and camo coats.

Out for dinner and we tried to find the restaurant that she had recommended but we could not so ended up going into a mall of restaurants and tourist shops but also many locals were there and found a pizza place. We always try pizza in every country we visit. We weren't impressed with the pizza in Buenos Aires but the pizza in Santiago was good. Yum. Thought we'd get a dessert but the ice cream place was closed so we went around the corner to get a McDonald's ice cream cone but it was packed with a longer line than anywhere else. Walked back to the hotel and spied an ice cream place just down the street so we got some that was probably much, much better than McDonald's.

In the morning, we are retrieved around 10 for the drive to Valparaiso. We only have a driver and our route will take us back past the airport, through the Casablanca area which is rich in vineyards and wineries. Poor hubby sleeps through most of it. Something about moving cars just lulls him to sleep. Valparaiso is a port city and over a few hills but not far from Santiago and is often where Santiagans go for a weekend retreat. Valparaiso is all hills, quite steep hills, many steep hills, and then the bay and port.

Most of Valparaiso is also one way streets because they are narrow and steep. So our driver winds his way up the hills and out of the port section and down various one way streets until he comes to a small dead end street and our boutique hotel is at the end of this street. This was one of the nicest places we stayed. Casa Higuruas was an old mansion that has been turned into a beautiful hotel with incredible views of the city and the hills and the bay. I think where were 4 or 5 floors. The reception is on the floor where you drive up then one or two floors above that for the guest rooms and then two floors below it for the living room, dining room, and spa and further down for the small swimming pool. Just lovely.

Since we were there a bit early, we didn't have a room ready yet so we sat in the living room and looked around and caught up with emails. It occurred to me at this point that on our return from Easter Island next week, we have one night stay in Santiago before we leave early the next morning for home. It also occurred to me that it was going to be incredibly stupid and tiring to fly into Santiago - drive into the city for one night at the same hotel that we just left and didn't like - then get picked up about 5 a.m. for the drive back to the airport for our flight home. I started contacting our SouthAmerica.travel agent for a change of venue. Surely Santiago has an airport hotel and it would make so much more sense to stay there for the overnight and plane change.

Our room is ready quickly and we discover there is an elevator/lift but it will only fit luggage or 2 people, not both. We walk up the stairs and the porter hauls our luggage up the stairs. I would have sent it in the elevator. Our room is lovely with a view of the city which is very, very colorful. Part of what makes people visit Valparaiso is the murals/graffiti. At some point, people started doing graffiti on building walls and then it became the "thing" to do. A lot of it is gang signs and taggers but there is some incredible artwork on the walls of buildings too. Valparaiso is a very conflicted city with amazing buildings and such next to dumps and deserted and derelict areas.

041417191706 ascensior or funicular

041417173747 mural or graffitti on side of building

041417173323 ascensior or funicular

041417164110 graffitti

041417163112 view of higher city - we're about halfway up hill

Lunch in the hotel and then our guide comes for our tour. Another facet of Valparaiso are the funiculars. At one point there were over 30 I think she said. Some are quite short but steep and they are all rather cheap, just a few hundred pesos to ride - the equivalent of less than $1 U.S., sometimes less than 50 cents. But like many things, a lot of funiculars have fallen into disrepair and been deserted and boarded over. The city leaders have realised now that these funiculars are also popular with the tourists so there are plans to re-open many of them and fix them up to use again. I am sure that the citizens of the city will appreciate this because those hills are sooooo steep.

Our guide takes us round to many of the murals that are by famous artists, she points out the different neighbourhoods, and takes us by some of the famous buildings - unfortunately now many in disrepair - and we ride up one funicular to an beautiful overlook of the city where the Esmeralda has come into port, a large sailing vessel on which each Chilean Naval Officer must take a training cruise. off in the distance is an aircraft carrier too. We have a lively discussion on whether it is or not but there's no ship with that kind of silhouette so i'm right. Then we drive to the neighbouring city which is where the rich people moved after it got too crowded in Valparaiso, Vina del Mar. Yep, many lovely homes and neighborhoods but also a sea lion "rock" with dozens of sea lions just right off the main drive.

Finally back in time to walk around our neighborhood and find a good place to eat dinner, besides the hotel although our hotel here had quite good food without being as froo-froo as some of the other places we have stayed.

Traveling to a new place or country, I do not do a tremendous amount of research other than finding tours, if needed, places to stay, if needed, transportation, etc, if needed. Being a very visual person, I do better reading up on a place after I have seen it and then the stories make more sense and I can picture the famous people of history in the location and visualize the moment. Usually I do know something about where I am going. I am going for a reason, albeit increasingly that reason is just "because I haven't been there." This was not the case with this trip which grew out of a desire to visit Easter Island and became a fly around Argentina and Chile and see what we can in 3 weeks.

I enlisted the services of SouthAmerica.travel as my agency and throughout, they did a terrific job of engaging local services, hand holding for me, organizing the flights and the cruise, and solving problems that arose. As I have been my own travel agent for years, it was rather nice to hand over some of the problems to another person. So the suggestions to add Buenos Aires and fly there to begin the trip was logical and I was quite interested to see B.A. because of Eva Peron.

I must admit that I don't know a whole lot about Argentina history and culture but I knew about her and felt that she was someone worth seeking out information once we got to B.A. Now I will also admit that most of what I know about her is courtesy of Andrew Lloyd Weber and his musical Evita. I knew this musical to be a fiction about a historical figure but somehow I did have the idea that the Argentine people did love Evita.

I think they do love Evita but we were about halfway through our city tour of driving around Buenos Aires before we were passing a park with a statue in it which our guide said - almost as we were past - that it was a statue of Eva Peron. STOP. We had already stopped at the generic flower - this monstrous metal flower with petals that open and close between day and night. Our guide was very taken with the flower. But this was the very first mention she had made of Evita. The driver was quick to pull over and stop so I could get out and take a photo. I must admit, she didn't look anything like Madonna.

Perhaps I should have said something to our guide that I'd like more information regarding Evita but somehow I just kept thinking it would come out in a gush of love and pride. nope. didn't happen. We did go to La Casa Rosada though, which is their presidential palace, The Pink House, and she did point out where Evita would stand to give speeches. She had two places, a larger balcony where the ministers would also be gathered and then a smaller balcony when she was just speaking or was just with her husband. good to know. And at that point we also found out that she is buried in Recoleta cemetery where we had gone earlier in the day to try and find her grave but had been unsuccessful because I hadn't even thought she might be buried under her real name of Maria Eva Duarte de Peron. She's in the Duarte family crypt.

So my impressions of Buenos Aires were colored by not finding much on Evita. It was still quite an interesting city and we saw some great things, had some really good food but my history lesson of that huge city shall remain very much in the illusion of Evita. Probably didn't help that I kept singing "Don't Cry for Me, Argentina" the whole time we were walking around.