Easter island
Easter Island has the particularity of being the most isolated island of the rest of the world, that is to say that its nearest neighbor is at, nevertheless, 2078 Kms. It is found in the South Pacific, off the coast of Chile to which it belongs.
Of triangular shape, it is formed of three volcanoes, the highest of which, to the North, culminates at more than 500m of height. The space between the two others, in the South, forms a long fertile plain. Of course, as the island is volcanic, the rock that makes it is too.
Its GPS coordinates are exactly 27 ° 6'45.80 "South / 109 ° 20'58.87" West. If you have the Google Earth software , click on this link or open it by double-clicking it, once downloaded: It will tell you the exact location of Easter Island: Google Earth Links.
Easter Island Map
Easter Island Map
Easter Island Map
The statues of Easter Island are spread all around the island. This curious distribution is original because the exceptions are rare, and the island, small, thus offers to the sight a succession of individual Moais or in group relatively regularly distributed along the coast. In practice they are a few hundred meters from the edge of the cliff, cliff face, almost - full island tour. Only the western part of Easter Island at a beach, anyway.
Layout on the island
The statues of Easter Island form a kind of symbolic barrier isolating the island from the ocean. And yet, this is not really the case because the population was mainly seafarers, so they had inherited this know-how from their Polynesian ancestors. So there was no reason to erect a barrier, it was symbolic, between the island and the ocean. The Moai had to have another use.
The other originality of their geographical situation lies in their orientation: They all look inland except one. This provision reinforces the idea that they were no longer there to ensure that ancestors watch the new generations evolve rather than deter any invasion of the island.
Finally, we must know that there are two kinds of sites on which the Moais were placed: They were either isolated or integrated into an ahu , a ceremonial platform. Such a platform hosts most of the time a row of statues, all perfectly aligned and oriented, so they contrast with the isolated statues.
The south coast of the island, 24 km long, hosts 13 ahus, plus two more inland. The North East Coast has 8, North West 5 plus two inland. Isolated statues are overwhelmingly positioned between the ahus, along the coast, with a slightly higher density on the eastern part of the island. The coasts bordering the two volcanoes to the south, are completely lacking, probably because of the difficulty to route them over rough terrain. The isolated Moaïs are rather to the west, apart from those around Rano Raraku's tuff quarry .
Note, and it is logical, that no statue is at altitude, because of the difficulty of bringing them there, probably.
Maps
World map World map
World map with location of Easter Island |
From a general point of view, Easter Island is in the heart of the Pacific. |
In the Pacific In the Pacific
In the Pacific |
If you get a little closer to the island, you will find that it is extremely isolated, the nearest islands are thousands of kilometers away. |
The island The island
The Easter island |
As we come closer we see that the island is unique, it is not an archipelago nor even a group of islands. |
Close to Easter Island Close to Easter Island
Close to Easter Island |
Approaching again we see that the island has a triangular shape. |
