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“In Chile, all wine is good” said my guide, Jaime Vargas,
Then, he pointed out the sandy, arid soil of the area. “The sandy type soil in the Santiago Valley is perfect for the cultivation of red grapes for the making of red wine” he said. “From Santiago to the coast, there are three valleys, all with different soils and climates” he added. After driving through a tunnel which was over a mile long, we entered the Curacavi Valley. “This area is great for cultivation of fruits and vegetables” Vargas said as we passed several farms teeming with lush crops such as peaches, oranges, lemons, avocados, nectarines, almonds, watermelons and tomatoes. Driving through yet another tunnel, we entered the Casablanca Valley. “Many years ago, it took two days to travel from Santiago to Valparaiso, and  travelers would stop in this area for the night. The
only house in the area was white, hence the name Casablanca” Vargas said. “This
area receives moisture from the ocean, and the soil is perfect for growing white
grapes for white wine” he said. After sipping some fine reserve chardonnay at
the Veramonte Vina, we pressed on to Valparaiso.
 
Driving into the city, I noticed very colorful houses literally perched on the
sides of cliffs. “The tremendous growth of the city was made possible by the
introduction of the ascensores, or funiculars, if you will” said Vargas as he
pointed to a rail going up the side of the mountain with a type of elevator on
it. “This was the first funicular built here. It was built in 1892” he said as I
boarded the antique elevator for a ride up the hill. Our next stop was the
multi-storied, colorful La Sebastiana, one of Chilean writer Pablo Neruda‘s
three homes. We then stopped for a few minutes at the Plaza Sotomayor, the
official heart of the city. On one end of the plaza was the beautiful
headquarters building of Chile’s navy.
On the opposite end was the Monument to Heroes. Next to the monument was what looked like the shell of a neo-classical building with a modern glass-exterior skyscraper built in the shell. “You will see a lot of that in Chile” Vargas said. “One of the earthquakes destroyed all but the shell of the old building, and the new building was built incorporating the old building in it” he explained. Our next stop was Vina del Mar, a nearby picturesque beach community which is the main vacation destination of central Chile.
Driving back to Santiago, our last stop of the day was at La Moneda, Chile’s presidential palace. As we approached the entrance, I noticed that the building was guarded by men in elaborate uniforms. “These men are the Presidential Guard. Their only function is to guard the president of Chile” Vargas said. Just before going through a metal detector at the entrance of the building’s courtyard, one of the guards, who was much larger than his colleagues, asked me where I lived. “Where you come from?” he asked in broken English. “Alabama, in The United States” I replied. “You like Chile?” he quizzed. “Yes. Very much” I said.
The next morning I flew for five hours to Easter Island. (Isla de Pascua in Spanish or Rapa Nui in the native Rapa language) Arriving during a light drizzle, I became alarmed as we dropped below the clouds in the huge Boeing 767 and saw how small the island was. “Is that island big enough for us to land on?” I asked the flight attendant. “Of course” she replied. “The runway was extended by the Americans for an emergency landing site for the space shuttle” she said. After checking into the quant Martin y Anita Hotel, I secured the guide services of anthropologist Esteban Sanchez.
We then embarked on an in-depth two day tour
of the island and it’s culture. After driving through Hanga Roa, the island’s
only town, we drove to Vaihu, an archeological site on the coast. Sanchez
explained that most of the early villages were built on the coast because fresh
water runs underground through volcanic rock to the coast, and can be retrieved
in certain places along the sea’s edge. “Captain Cook recorded in his log that
the natives drank salt
As
we climbed the mountain, I noticed dozens of statues dotted along the side of
the mountain, and several half carved ones still in the side of the mountain.
Next we drove to Anakena, one of the few white-sand beaches on the island. There
were seven Moi on one platform and a lone one on another. “The lone moi was
re-erected by Thor Heyerdahl in the 1950s. The other seven were restored in
1979. It was here we learned that the moi originally
 had coral or stone inlaid
for eyes” said Sanchez. While we had already eaten lunch, I couldn’t resist the
grilled chicken legs being cooked on the beach by local citizens. While a bit
pricey by American standards, the taste made up for the four-dollar price for
the fowl. Driving back to the hotel that evening, I mentioned to Sanchez that I
had noticed a large number of horses running loose throughout the island. “There
is no need to fence them in. They can’t leave the island” Sanchez said with a
smile. “The number of horses one owns is a symbol of his wealth in our culture”
he added. The following morning we went to the Orongo Ceremonial Village high atop Rano
Kau volcano. “This is the site of the birdman competition” Sanchez said.
“Makemake was the deity of the Rapa Nui people. He is said to have created the
Earth, moon and sun.
 He also brought birds to the island” he continued. Just off
the island at the foot of the mountain was three smaller islands, Moto Nui, Motu
Iti and Motu Kao Kao. Birds would nest on these islands at a certain time of the
year. During this time the tribal chiefs would climb to the village at the top
of the mountain and live in stone houses during the competition. Their best
warriors would descend the mountain, swim to the smaller islands, retrieve a
bird’s egg and take it unbroken back to Orongo. “The first chief to receive an
egg became governor of the entire island for one year” Sanchez said. “While the
birdman competition had religious overtones, it was really a competition for
power on the island” he added. After viewing some petroglyphs, looking into some
of the restored stone houses and taking in the breathtaking view from the top of
the mountain, we headed to Ana Kai Tangata, meaning “man eating cave” in
English.  “We know that people lived here” Sanchez said. “However, I think that
people came here to learn, not to participate in cannibalism” he said. While
flying home and nursing a severe sunburn I received on the island, the mysteries
of the island kept running through my mind. How did they originally get to the
most isolated island on Earth? How did they live on the island’s scant natural
resources? How did they carve and transport statues weighing several tons miles
without much more than sticks and stones? How was this civilization destroyed?
While we may never know, it was a trip of a lifetime to see this remote,
fascinating island firsthand. |
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as I sipped some
fine chardonnay reserve at the Veramonte Vina near Santiago. “We don’t have bad
wine, just different degrees of good” he added with a smile. This was my first
stop on what was to be a great ten-day trip around Santiago and Easter Island.
water, but they were actually drinking fresh water” he
said. As we approached the site, I noticed that all of the statues here, or moi
were toppled over. “The statues were a symbols of the power of the clan” Sanchez
said. “Between 1722 and 1850 all of the statues were toppled” he said.
While
many theories exist as to why the statues weighing several tons each were
toppled, Sanchez said his thought is that the destruction was caused by clan
warfare. “The winner destroyed the symbols of power for the looser. A current
example is when the Americans toppled the statues of Saddam Hussein in Iraq” he
said. “The population of the island was decimated by a Peruvian slave raid in
1862 so much of the oral tradition is lost forever and we may never know”
Sanchez said. He explained that such clan conflict was likely over the island’s
scant resources. “Money didn’t exist on the island. The currency of the day was
food. The chiefs paid for work on the statues with food. When food was short,
work stopped” he said. Walking around the site,
Sanchez pointed out several
stones on the ground arranged in the shape of boats. “These were the foundations
of the houses of important people in the clan” he said. “They were constructed
by boring holes in these stones to support sticks. The banana leaves would be
used over the sticks” he added. Sanchez explained that the houses were used only
for sleep. “Everything was public. There was no privacy. Only important people
lived in the boat houses, the common people lived in the interior of the island
or in caves” he said.
Next, we visited a site where several statues (Moi) had
been restored. “The Moi represented society at the time it was made. A fat Moi
represents a time with more food” Sanchez said as he pointed out the different
sizes of the statues. Several of the statues had a red-colored top on them that
appeared to be hats. ’They are called top-knots” Sanchez said. “They were carved
from a reddish soft volcanic rock from the Puna Pau volcanic crater. They each
weigh about the same as two elephants, so it was quite a job to put them up” he
said. As he explained that in Polynesian culture, red is the color of royalty,
Sanchez said “many early European sailors recorded that the chiefs here had red
colored hair” he said. After a brief lunch of sardines and bread, we climbed to
the top of Rano Raraku mountain, the island’s quarry for the giant statues.
