Days 36-38 Feb 10-12

Day 36 (very SPECIAL) Sunday Feb 10
Much to our surprise, we made it to Easter Island! We now understand the Captain’s concerns, there is a very narrow channel into the dock, between rocks, which only 1 tender at a time can negotiate. The small tenders from the ship were used, which only take 50 people at a time, so it was some job getting half the ship off in the morning and half off in the afternoon. We take it all back, the crew did a great job. We went in mini-buses on our tours, fortunately ours was air-conditioned, not all of them were. Most of the roads we travelled on were dirt roads, so quite bumpy and uncomfortable, but it was definitely worth a little discomfort!
I went on a tour ‘Ancient Cultures of Easter Island’, which first went to visit the only site where 7 Maui look out to sea, Ahu Akivi, all the other Maui look inland, nobody knows why. The site was restored in the 1960s, so the Maui are standing upright, at one time they were all on the ground,toppled towards the end of the 17th century it is believed. I felt very awed and as our table discussed later, all religious sites have a power which can’t be explained, I certainly felt some sort of connection to something else, it’s impossible to put into words. We then visited a site which is unrestored, Ahu Vaihu. Our guide was very upset that the site has not been fully fenced off, because there are wild horses on the island and they drink the water which collects in the upturned ‘hats’ or ‘topknots’ and so erode them further. Since all the sites are World Heritage sites she thinks they should be better protected and she’s right, I guess either the will or the money isn’t there. Finally we visited an extinct volcano, Rano Kau, which contains a freshwater lake & a micro-climate where all sorts of fruits & vegetables can be grown ‘in the wild’. Very close by is Orongo village, the ‘Bird-man’ village, which is where an annual ritual took place until the 1860s. The young men had to climb down the cliff, swim 1.6km and collect a sooty tern bird’s egg from an island. Whoever returned all the way back with an unbroken egg was the chief for the next year. There are also ancient petroglyphs carved in the rocks, once again I had to overcome my fear of heights, ‘Kiwi’ Keith took my photo to prove it, he’s a sheep farmer from near Christchurch, and was in my bus.
Unfortunately all the tours arrived back at the dock at once, and since only 50 to a tender, &, according to Roger ‘the dentist’ (lectures in dentistry, lives 6 months per year in the former NZ P.M’s David Lange? house in Kiaori in Wellington, I do move in exalted circles!), 5 tenders per hour, you can just work out how long it took to get us back on board. We were expecting to make lunch in the Lido, instead it was a larger tea than normal!
I went to the sail-away party, & because it was really hot, particularly dancing the improvised samba we managed, I drank beer rather than champagne, which is very expensive anyway. Then we all ate in the Lido because it was too late for the restaurant, & the end of a very very special day, the highlight of the cruise I think, but see Terrific Tuesday below, the jury’s still out!
Day 37 (Moaning) Monday Feb 11
Went to 2 lectures today, one given by a former BBC guy who worked on Film Night & Film 70something to 80something with Barry Norman, which was interesting anecdotes about the stars he’d met and/or interviewed, and then Peter Crimes on Tahiti, which was a sell-out again. There were some very rude people in front of us, there was a bit of a contretemps when someone wished to get to a seat inside, which involved them getting up. The lady was slightly disabled, but some people do think they own the ship and are rather selfish.
Heard at lunchtime that a passenger was ‘thrown off’ the ship at Easter Is, & told to make his own way from there. Apparently he had been drunk a lot, sworn at lots of people and made lewd suggestions to (female) members of the crew. When confronted by the captain, he apparently told him to ‘F.. off’, not a good idea! The captain’s rule is law on board ship, which he learnt to his cost. Rumour has it that he’d spent all his money too, Just goes to show that you have to behave on here.
Went swimming again and got sunburnt again, you’d think I’d learn wouldn’t you?
We all got upset at the evening meal because we were told, not asked, that we had to be at our table by 6.15 because of ‘kitchen problems’. We always get there by 6.30, & since ‘last orders’ are supposed to be at 6.45 we don’t think this is unreasonable. Hilary in particular was annoyed, particularly as she managed to squirt garlic butter all over her blouse & silk trousers. We noticed as we left, at 7.30, that our ‘section’ i.e. run by the same waiters, was completely clear, in contrast to all the others where people were still eating. Alan resolved to raise it with the maitre d’ at some point.
Managed to lose almost all the money I’ve won in the casino, oh well, easy come, easy go! Clocks went back 2 hours tonight, in order to be correct at Pitcairn tomorrow.
Day 38 (Terrific) Tuesday Feb 12
This was a really exciting day, and we do feel really privileged to be here (I guess that’s true!). 28 of the islanders from Pitcairn came out in a longboat from their very small island & sold their mostly hand-made wares in a kind of market in the Grand Lounge while we sailed round the island twice. It is a very green & lush island, we were surprised how big the houses were, though since there are only 50 inhabitants in total there aren’t many of them! The great-great grandson of Fletcher Christian gave a talk, I missed it but it was recorded so will watch it later on the TV. The wood carvings were beautiful, I bought a couple but may have trouble getting them into NZ I think. Also posted some cards, which will not be posted from Pitcairn until the supply ship arrives in 3 weeks, so don’t hold your breath! The people were lovely, very friendly and almost all European looking, I guess we shouldn’t have been surprised since Pitcairn is still British and of course the mutineers were British. Almost all the people are descended from 6 of the original mutineers, there are lots of Christians, Hilary bought a wood carving made by Randy Christian (don’t laugh!).
I spent all the money I had been saving for the waiters’ tips, they aren’t going to get any extra now. Alan did speak to the maitre d’ this morning, and there was no central edict, just our waiters trying to give themselves a longer break between sittings we think. Vlada did apologise, but that doesn’t change anything.
RADA graduates gave a performance of Shakespeare’s Richard III, condensed into 50 mins, which was brilliant, they are doing ‘Withering (sic) Heights’ on Sunday (the announcer, James Nelson, is one of the Cunard singers and obviously not a student of Emily Bronte!).