The Mysteries of Easter Island> Remote Pacific culture keeps its secrets, overseen by famous stone carvings

Official visitor information designates Easter Island as “the most isolated place on the face of the earth.” It has, nonetheless, embraced every opportunity to share its particular brand of mystery and magic with the modest but constant traffic of international travelers.

Two thousand three hundred fifty miles from Chile’s midcoast, in the blue expanses of the Pacific, is a community of roughly 3,000 people whose indifference to the rest of the world is commensurate with the rest of the world’s hazy knowledge of its very existence. A handful of descendants of the HMS Bounty mutineers still clinging to Pitcairn Island are, 1,250 miles to its northwest, its closest neighbors.

No place more accurately exemplifies or is as deserving of the modifier “remote” than is Easter Island. Its unique status as an emergency landing site for the NASA space shuttle has broadened accessibility by attracting regular commercial air traffic. Expanded by the U.S. government in the late 1980s expressly for a possible unforeseen shuttle visit, the runway at the Island’s Mataveri Airport welcomes thrice weekly LanChile flights from Santiago.

Sharing the typical fate of those exhausted by colonialism, Easter Island might well have continued a ruinous decline toward obscurity and irrelevance were it not for a series of expeditions initiated in 1955 by Norwegian explorer Thor Heyerdahl. Many of his conclusions, including his theory that much Pacific Island culture had its origins in the Americas, enjoy little respect from today’s anthropological community. Heyerdahl nevertheless is in no small part responsible for guaranteeing Easter Island and the images associated with it a place in the popular consciousness. The island’s mystery, intrigue and excitement, once cloistered by thousands of miles of ocean and dusty academic treatises were, in a way, liberated by “Aku Aku,” Heyerdahl’s best-selling account of his experiences and theories on Easter Island. Considered more a good read than an authoritative account, the book aroused the curiosity of an inquisitive world.

Rarely a destination for those seeking a South Seas tropical paradise, is Rapa Nui, or “Great Island,” as it is known to its Polynesian inhabitants. On it are the legions of stone figures, the “moari,” that punctuate an otherwise severe landscape. The blank, enigmatic stares of these imposing monoliths are as curious as the origins of the people responsible for them; riddles that have taunted yet intrigued archaeologists and anthropologists since Dutch sailors in 1722 opened the door for further European discovery and, ultimately, Chilean exploitation.

With their curiously proportioned bodies and elongated heads with broad noses and pendulous ears, the moari once jabbed 25 feet into the Polynesian skies. Situated in neat rows, their majesty was heightened from a position atop great stone altars known as ahus. Commonly held to represent ancestors and chiefs, they encircled the island at its perimeter, their backs to the sea and the churning hostility of a reefless coastline.

Their imposing presence was not sufficient to intimidate rival clans and warring tribes who toppled what they knew to be sacred to their adversaries.

Any of the moari erect today have been restored over the past century. Among these is the formidable Ahu Tongariki. Having once suffered the hostilities of local unrest, this most impressive of Easter Island’s ahus has succumbed to a more impetuous foe. Destruction by a tidal wave in 1960 and the subsequent restoration have done nothing to reduce the timeless, noble presence it commands. Erect and soldierly atop its 475-foot platform, the 15 moari of Ahu Tongariki epitomize the spirit and essence of Rapa Nui.

The majesty of the site defies assumptions on the supposed limitations in the absence of modern technology. Befuddled pedagogues, despite lifetimes of research and scholarly pursuit, continue to debate the engineering feats exhibited in the carving, transportation and erection of the stone giants.

Neighbor to the 15 moari of Ahu Tongariki is Rano Raraku. An extinct volcano about a mile and a half inland and to the west, Rano Raraku is the quarry from which the moari stone was taken. It remains the home to hundreds more sculptures mysteriously abandoned. Etched from the face of cliffs and outcroppings, layered, terraced and angled, they lie in various stages of completion. Their silent companions are the more than 100 others that meander up and down the crater’s interior, outside and down the face to the base of the volcano.

Completed and extracted from the quarry, these are the guardians of this special place. Heaved and pitched by erosion and time, some lean forward or back; others peer through waist-high grass. Never hoisted atop stone pedestals by their Polynesian subjects, they attract the admiration of visitors for whom they are Easter Island’s most striking and enduring image. The moari of Rano Raraku impress through their abandonment, isolation and collective solitude. To see them lends resolution to obscure childhood images of lost cultures and civilizations; to experience them is to be awed by the reality of these images.

In the debate over the origins of Easter Island’s population, from a tourist perspective the appropriate question might be less “Where did they come from?” than “Why did they stay?” The terrain is harsh and uninviting, recalling the bleak images of the Martian landscape; the treacherousness of the lava-encrusted coast a constant victim of the bludgeoning surf.

Still, the absence of manicured golf courses, swank resorts and boutiques does little to discourage those making the 5 1/2-hour flight from Santiago to appreciate the carefully marketed charms of Easter Island. The finite recreational opportunities on this 64-square-mile island suggest that its appeal lies almost exclusively in its enigmatic past.

With little to offer in the way of natural resources, tourism has become the mainstay of its economy. Independent guides are plentiful and will incorporate a visit to the ruins of the ceremonial village of Orongo, as well as point out petroglyphs, stone carvings depicting gods and heroes, adorning the moari and ahu sites. For about $25, Patricio of Ao Tour, for instance, will spend a day with a small group explaining in depth and in several languages the background and significance of Easter Island archaeology.

While focusing primarily on the archaeology and anthropology, one must be careful not to overlook Easter Island’s diverse community. Despite the island’s annexation by Chile in 1889, most islanders consider themselves Rapa Nui and live in the island’s only town, Hanga Roa, a blend of Wild West and sleepy Pacific island community. Hanga Roa’s few neatly paved streets are shared by people on foot, horseback, bicycle and in cars.

A range of accommodations is available. If one is less concerned with convenience and comfort, rather Spartan rooms or residenciales, including an equally Spartan breakfast, can be had for $18-$40 a night. More conventional hotel arrangements are an option at significantly higher prices but don’t expect the Ritz-Carlton.

Several unassuming eateries offer reasonably priced seafood. For about $20 one can embrace island tradition on an island night at Restaurant Kona Koa, one of the island’s more upscale dining establishments. A generous seafood buffet and abundant servings of wine capped by a performance of traditional dancing and music make for a festive evening. Lingering after the tropical frivolities, you might encounter one of Easter Island’s foremost agitators who is as generous at espousing the virtues of Rapa Nui independence as the restaurant is with its buffet. At this point in the evening, the Banana Cafe, opening at 10 p.m., is the preferred option for enjoying a few nightcaps with the locals.

Hanga Roa’s market welcomes traders ranging from jewelers to fishermen. Island crafts appeal to a broad spectrum of international visitors, but noticeably few Americans They are priced, as is nearly everything, in U.S. dollars. Offering to pay in the official currency of Chilean pesos often generates puzzled looks from clerks and attendants who scurry for calculators to figure the exchange.

Seeing Easter Island on foot, hiking to some of the more remote sites, is an excellent way to see the landscape and to check out subtleties that could be missed on an organized excursion. Renting a small four-wheel-drive vehicle for $45 a day is a an option for covering more ground and maybe revisiting sites pointed out by a guide or discovered on foot. Horses are also an option, but don’t expect to saddle up Traveler or Black Beauty. They’re a stubborn breed and generally unappealing to most visitors who are probably more accustomed to a better fed and disciplined steed.

Regardless of the mode of transportation, visitors will be impressed by the atmosphere of openness and congeniality. Eager to share their unique culture, the Rapa Nui assist in making it accessible through their hospitality, warmth and genuine interest in the satisfaction of their guests.

In a world that routinely enjoys the evolution of technological concepts into reality, where ceaseless innovation is accompanied by a hubristic sophistication that no longer considers the “what ifs” but only the “whens,” it is difficult to imagine that there could exist a place considered remote. In an age when secrets of our physical world are compromised daily by an inquisitiveness that has been rewarded with medical insights, an understanding of the intricacies of our natural world and the confidence to look beyond our own planet, it is difficult to imagine that there could exist a place considered mysterious.

Easter Island is such a place. By retaining a past that defies explanation, it will always attract, entertain and mystify those who embrace the unknown as a welcome oasis from a calculating and precise world.