Easter Island Is Cursed!

Traveling to distant countries can occasionally lead to a few minor injuries: a toe stubbed on a rock, a sprained ankle, or a bit of food poisoning. Easter Island, however, smacked us around like rag dolls.

On our second day, I agreed to go horseback riding with Robin, and the outing turned into a 4-hour trek up the island’s largest extinct volcano. The hard, padding-free saddle and my complete lack of technique led to some major chaffing and lost skin. Even Robin was sore from the ride.

The following morning, I went swimming and managed to step on a really sharp rock that took a chunk out of my right foot.

But the grand finale was a perfectly-executed, synchronized double dive into a Rapa Nui gutter. As we left the island’s Film Festival, we walked down the darkened street on what we believed to be the sidewalk. It turned out to be a “covered” gutter, and by “covered” I mean “a partially capped 3-foot-deep gutter with giant holes in the top”:

Ultra-safe Rapa Nui "sidewalk".

We walked a few steps on a long segment of gutter topper, paused a few seconds to figure out if we were going the right way, and then both stepped forward into thin air. To bystanders, it must have looked like a Roadrunner & Wile E. Coyote cartoon. We both skinned our shins, and Robin scraped up both of her hands.

Us, stepping off the "sidewalk".

Given all the injuries, would I go there again? ABSOLUTELY!! Easter Island was so unique and so fascinating that I’d gladly scrape a little more skin off my legs to see it. Luckily we didn’t lose any teeth or vital organs, nor did we break anything (I was carrying my laptop when I fell), so the story has a [relatively] happy ending.

Would you trade a little bit of pain & blood for a view like this?

Yeah, like no one's ever taken a picture like this, eh?