Easter Island and Pitcairn Island by Adam Boyle

Easter Island

Easter Island is one of the most mysterious places ever. What makes it so mysterious is that huge stone carved statues called monoliths surround the Island. They are called monoliths because they are carved out in one piece. On Easter Island these monoliths are called Moai (pronounced moe-eye), and nobody really knows for sure what the island statues are there for, what they represent, why the people made them, or when they got there.

The most widely-accepted theory is that the first people who arrived on the island were Polynesian colonizers. The statues were said to have been first carved by these colonizers of the island sometime around 1000-1100 A.D. with the first people arriving around 400-700 A.D. These statues may have represented deceased ancestors, and also may represent powerful living chiefs that once reigned the island.

Another theory is that the inhabitants of this island came from Bolivia in South America. These people were trying to escape the collapse of their pre-Inca Tihuanaco civilization and fled to Easter Island. These people were sun-worshipers and had stone masonry skills.

Many of the Moai have been placed near the coastline. They usually are made up of compressed volcanic ash (95% of the 887 Moai known to date) and are as tall as 13 feet high and can weigh up to 14 tons. These statues were carved right out of the volcanic stone and were then transported to where they were to be located. We saw many of these monoliths along the coast line as we explored the island. Some of them have been displaced and some broken when a tsunami hit the island many years ago. With the help of the Japanese and other archaeologists, they were restored and put back together in this location. Only 394 statues remain visible here, out of the 887 known to have been built.

This island was a great place to visit and explore. It is called Easter Island because it was discovered by the Dutch seaman named Roggeven on Easter Sunday in 1722.

Pitcairn Island

Pitcairn Island is in the South Pacific about halfway between South America and Australia. It is literally in the middle of no where and only 48 people live on this island. Pitcairn Island is a territory of the United Kingdom and was made famous as the place where the mutiny on the HMS Bounty took place. The Bounty was the ship that had Captain Bligh get killed by his crew including first mate Fletcher Christian. This story has been told in books and movies.

Since the island is so small we didn’t actually dock at the island nor have tenders land there, so the people from the island took a small boat of their own and boarded our ship. They brought with them their artistic creations and only a handful of people were left on the island (a person in jail, the person’s guard and a couple elderly ladies).