Day 87 February 4th 2007, The Discovery Channel -Easter Island

Today whilst we toured the west side of the Island some of its mysteries were revealed, much like watching the discovery channel for the day. To help everyone out here is a summary of the events which have occurred on Easter Island, more detail to follow.

1. Polynesians arrive and start to populate Island, how did they get here? Here is a good answer
2. Chief has 6 sons and each one forms a clan
3. Each clan builds Ahu (stone platform) and then places Moai (stone statues on top) to protect the clan
4. A class system forms with two classes, the long ears at the top and the short ears at the bottom.
5. Eventually a class war takes place and the short ears kick the long ears into extinction
6. The Moai are toppled in all the fighting

After the age of the Moai for want of a better expression the various clans competed each year for control of the island through the bird man competition. Below are some cave paintings depicting the birdmen. This was a ceremony where each clan sent its strongest young man to compete each year.

The young men would wait in small stone huts on the side of a volcano overlooking an Island just off the shore, waiting for the sooty terns which nest there to lay an egg, they would then climb down a jagged lava formed cliff, swim in the strong currents dodging sharks to the Island. At the same time doing their best to do each other over. The man who found the first egg was declared the winner. His Clan leader would become the leader of the Island and for his troubles he would be awarded the best looking virgin on the Island for his wife.

Below is the inside of the crater next to where the birdman competition was held, the reeds inside are the same as those found in Lake Titikaka in Peru.

Below is the Island where the Sooty Tern's nest, on the rock you can see a Petroglyph, these are carvings which can be found all over the Island So after the clan wars there were no Moai left standing, all those like the ones below have been restored. Each Moai represents a former leader of the clan whose power was contained within the Moai after death, one of the reasons why they were toppled in the war. When a clan leader died eyes made from coral would be placed in the Moai. The eyes havent been restored as the Islanders who are all descendants of the short ears are very superstitious and don't want to bring back the spirit of the long ears.

Some of the Moai would have had what look like hats, one theory is that the red boulders below represent their hair which was tied in a top knot. The Moai's although grey now originally would have been yellow in color so with the red top knots and coral eyes would have been very colorful indeed.

Being formed by volcanoes the Island has quite a few lava tubes and caves, Shelley is in the blue hat below.
Being the festival one of the events was a banana sled race, the Easter Islanders seem to very competitive with some sort of race or competition being held every day. Dressed as their ancestors would these guys hurtled down the hill on a sled made from a banana tree trunk. No one seemed to know who the winner was but with an exciting atmosphere, practically the whole Island had turned up, it was great to watch.

After feeling like I had watched the Discovery Channel all day as we travelled round the Island it was cool to meet up with and be interviewed by a camera crew from no less than the Discovery Channel, my 20 seconds of fame should qualify me for celebrity big brother next year.

Highlights: The Banana sled racing