Easter Island photos

The internet connection here seems amazingly fast. I have just uploaded an insane number of full-quality photos in the space of an hour or two. (I think it was peaking at something like 6Mbit/second.)

Anyway, photos are here:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/45804996@N03/sets/72157623618747317/

I know there are far too many but since this is my backup as well I wanted to include potential to-be-stitched-into-a-panorama-later sets.

There's exactly one photo with me in, so I've included it even though I seem to have my eyes shut (or maybe I'm just squinting because of the sunlight).

Arrived in Buenos Aires

3:45pm local time, just checked in at the self-serviced apartment. It's a large studio apartment, but it is large and probably swisher than the one in Santiago. But best of all IT'S AIRCONDITIONED. It is damned hot here. Admittedly I was wearing my fleece (because it was too damn bulky to squeezed into my backpack, and because I've got into a bad habit of lugging it around even if I don't wear it for the pockets it contains) and I was carting luggage around, but it was OK in Santiago this morning and here it's hot. They said when we landed it was 28C and I can believe it, to be honest I'm surprised it's that low.

Oh, and there's (cabled) internet access. Woohoo! I am going to start uploading some of the Easter Island photos and have a much-needed shower, then I will pop out and see what the immediate area is like and maybe buy a bottle or two of diet coke so I can take advantage of having my own fridge again. :-)

Waffle in transit

Wed, 10am. Didn't sleep very well, I'm not sure why but I have this recollection of semi-nightmarish dreams. Alarm set for 8am but I dozed uncomfortably (mostly with palindromes from Wield Al Yankovic's "Bob" stuck in my head, for some reason) til I dragged myself out of bed at 8:30. The worst of a shared bathroom is having to get dressed before you can go to the toilet. I was fairly gagging for it by the time I dragged myself out of bed and then the extra delay of dressing was not welcome.

Checked out about 9, got the metro and bus over here no problem (I guess I left it late enough to miss rush hour, and the airport bus was surprisingly empty too). I got here a few minutes ago, I am stood in a queue of people at what I hope is the Aerolineas Argentinas check in desk but there are no staff and no flight numbers showing. It doesn't help that my flight was originally due out at 10:25 but I am practically certain it has been put back two hours or so as I got notified by e-mail. A good thing in a way, it was bad enough getting the flight at the current time.

Ah, the guy in front of me in the queue (which is now lengthening considerably) has left his passport and self-printed ticket thing on top of his case and I can see he's on my flight, which suggests I am queueing in the right place. Or we're both wrong of course.

10:25am. We are still stood queuing here with no sign of any staff. Considering the flight leaves at 12:50 and I was told (via my parents, when I got them to call to reconfirm) I had to be at the airport two hours before the flight, you might hope there would be some staff around by now.

My legs hurt. There is something oddly uncomfortable about standing here.

10:40am. Just checked in. All OK, and that may be the first time I've gone through the process entirely in Spanish.

12:15pm. Had a ham & cheese sandwich and a donut at the airport, I might as well spend some of my Chilean cash. Been waiting at the gate for a while now. For what it's worth, this is all in 'proper' buildings, none of the tent stuff I saw on the flight in from Arica or out to Easter Island.

Last night in Santiago, again

Tue, 9:10pm. Just checked in at the hostel in Santiago, come out for food and probably a beer or two. I checked reception was 24h, the woman said yes but pulled a face as if she'd rather you didn't. I said I'd be back by midnight or 1 though and that seemed to cheer her up.

Got the bus and metro over here. Not sure what to do tomorrow. It occurs to me if I'm leaving the hostel around 8am it may well be rush hour. So a cab may be impractical or stupidly expensive if it's not a flat fare, but then again the metro may be rammed too. Oh well.

Tue 9:55pm. Had an acceptable and fairly large portion of steak and chips, though for all my whinging about the prices on Easter Island it was 9400 approx with tip. It was only a cheap-ish looking place, I think that was a bit pricey but maybe I imagined it. Have come down to Romano's on Pio Nono, where I was last time I was here, it being the first half decent bar I came across. The beer *is* cheaper, 2000 for a litre bottle of Cristal compared to 1500 for a 350ml can on the island.

On the plane

Tue, 12:50pm. Just watching them load some cargo containers onto the plane, which is something I haven't seen before. We are on board now, I am watching through the window. Unless there is a sudden rush of late boarders, the plane (oddly, given how full the one out here was) is half empty. I have an empty seat next to me and the two middle groups of 3 I can see from here are totally unoccupied.

Tue, 3:40pm (Easter Island). We just got asked if there was anyone with medical knowledge on the plane as a passenger needs assistance...

Tue 4:30pm. Just watched 'The invention of lying'. The premise was not applied very consistently and I thought the ending sucked (it wasn't very interesting, plus I was hoping he wouldn't marry whats-her-name insofar as I could bring myself to care) but I did snicker out loud (a bit embarassing on a flight) at the scene where he was addressing the crowd about religion, and also (oddly) when he did the "what's that over there" bit in the casino.

Abuja in Africa has been promoted to world prominence on the inflight map along with Brasilia and Washington.

Was vaguely tempted to watch Gran Torino, but being a smart chap I checked and realised there isn't enough flight time remaining. If I watch half of it I will never watch the entire thing.

Oh, I asked at reception this morning and they said yes, I had paid. So although it's annoying I forgot to write it down (or it got lost afterwards), that was OK.

Easter Island, part 10

Tue, 1:10am. Oh, for the first time the hotel gates were shut and the taxi left me in the street. I don't know if it's deliberate or just lucky but there was a gap at the side of the gate I could squeeze through to get in. I had visions of having to climb the gate but fortunately it didn't come to that.

Tue, 10:20am. Just checked in for the flight. Security doesn't open til 11:30 and there's nothing here except two souvenir shops. Oh well. They scanned my bags (for forbidden fruit and the like) before letting me check in. I don't know what would stop me wandering into town and buying an apple now and secreting it in my hand luggage.

I walked from the hotel to the airport. I did a bit more than necessary as I lugged the bags up an extra 3-400m to Aringa Ora on the offchance it was open so I could get a late breakfast/early lunch. Staff were there doing stuff (at about 10am) but they told me they don't open til 1pm. Oh well. I'm not actually hungry yet and I've saved ten quid by not eating here another time.

I didn't want to get up, I woke up about 9am but kept snoozing until 9:30 when I made a superhuman effort. I checked out with 10 mins to spare so it was all OK.

I do note there is a sign saying 'Bar Snack' down at the other end where the toilets are, but apart from a few empty chairs there is no obvious sign of life or service.

Tue 12:20pm. Been through security, now waiting in the surprisingly pleasant open air bit on the other side watching people scuttle around the plane, I assume we will board soonish.

There seemed to be some activity round the snack bar earlier so I wandered over to take a look. It was open and although not great value, considering it's an airport on this expensive island, CLP3000 for a modest ham and cheese toasted sandwich and an espresso isn't too bad. (I didn't tip, I don't know if it was expected but as I sat at the bar to eat I figured sod it.) I assume we will get some food on the plane, which may or may not be edible, but at least I've now eaten something today.

Canadian bloke from the tours and who I bumped into yesterday is on my flight, I have seen him wandering round but haven't spoken to him. I was tempted to, but then (and this is nothing personal towards him, he seems a nice chap) I was struck by a fear we'd end up sat next to each other by chance, which would be awkward for 4-5h.

The more I think about it the more stupid that is, if we are sat next to each other it's just as awkward whether or not we've spoken to each other in the airport first. Duh!

Tue 12:30pm. They just called first class boarding (the announcement was a bit inaudible, I didn't have a clue what the Spanish version said but fortunately they repeated it in English, though in a situation like this you can just follow the crowd even if you don't have a clue what's happening). So I guess we plebs will be boarding soon, and I might as well send this.

(I assume there's little business travel to/from the island. So presumably first class is for the islanders who have been raking it in by overcharging hardworking tourists like me. :-) )

Easter Island, part 9

pMon 11:15pm. I sent the last post despite it not being the end of the night as my phone showed signs of struggling when I made additions. I mean, it only has about 1-2MB of memory free and the e-mail must have been all of 10 or 20KB, so it's quite reasonable.

It occurs to me, as it has done elsewhere, there is little danger of missing the flight as I will be disturbed by the cleaner in plenty of time. There is maybe a danger of being stung for an extra night's accommodation though, if I end up being woken by the cleaner. (I must say, given I checked out nearly an hour late at my second hostel in Arica due to my clock being wrong the whole time I was there, it was very decent of them not only not to try that on, but not even to make tutting comments and say they'd let me off. I got no clue at all I was running an hour behind. This is perhaps even more surprising given I had probably hacked them off by turning up well after midnight every night, and even later than I thought due to the same clock problem.)

Mon 11:45pm. Just ordered another beer, my seventh and probably last. The couple just left.

Apropos of nothing, I am inclined to observe that if some major catastrophe struck (Western?) civilisation tomorrow before 1pm when I fly back, I would be far from sorted. The island is not self-sufficient in food according to one of the tour guides (and, although it's a luxury in this context, the electricity is from diesel generators, presumably run off fuel shipped in). I can't help thinking that it would be peculiarly grim being stuck out here (as a local, not just as a tourist, though that would add an extra dynamic to the hypothetical novel) under such circumstances. At least on the mainland, or a decent-sized island like the UK (moreover, one could imagine UK survivors crossing the channel if push came to shove), the struggle to survive post-disaster would be a contest for a fairly decent level of extant resources and with at least the potential for self-sufficiency. Here the struggle would probably be particularly nasty and brutish. (There are a few farms, and some cows and c
hickens, I have seen the latter with my own eyes.) Though I don't have the talent to write it, and it's probably been done (I would like to read it if I knew who had done it), I can't help thinking there's a half-decent novel in that observation.

(Although I doubt things could be developed quickly enough, I do have some idea the native population at its peak here - and obviously self-supporting at the time - was larger than the current population, maybe by a factor of two or three, though this is straining my recollection and may well be wrong. But as I say, that's a bit irrelevant in that hypothetical situation.)

(If I didn't make the observation while I was down there - I certainly shared it with the local brother and sister I met on the ferry as we watched night fall - according to something I read on straightdope.com, some scientists worked out back in the 80s (?) that Tierra del Fuego would be the last habitable spot on the planet after a global nuclear war, based on IIRC likely targets and prevailing weather systems. Not to say it would remain habitable indefinitely, but it would remain so longer than elsewhere.)

You'd think it would be at least as economical to ship beer kegs out as individual 350ml cans, surely? Maybe some place I haven't been here serves beer on tap, but I doubt it. Maybe it's partly cultural, but I suspect there is some bizarre economic motive at work here.

Tue, 12:30am. Just got back. The radio (?) in the taxi was playing Morrissey's "Suedehead" (I think - lyrics"I'm so sorry") on the way back. Was talking to the owner again when I went in to pay and asked them to call me a cab. He got to mentioning the discos on Saturday night, I said I couldn't go as I had to be up early the next day for tours but not sure if I got it across. I am half sorry I didn't experience that, but if I ever return - maybe in the really off-season when airfares and hotels are cheaper - I can do it then, when I won't be burdened with the need to do tours. I suspect I will never come back, and I'm not too bothered, but it's always good to leave something for a subsequent visit I guess.

(I did also see people driving round the island on quad bikes. It would have been quite cool to hire one, and I suspect even I could handle that with the limited traffic here, but I didn't bring my driving licence with me - figuring it would only ever be needed for car hire, which I would never do - so I couldn't pursue it. Another one of those 'next time' things.)

Feel pretty sober really. Not a bad night in a quiet sort of way. Anyway, a quick shower and then bed.

Easter Island, part 8

Sun, 11:25pm. No idea what it's actually like out, but to judge from the noise it's pissing it down and has been for a while. Wind sounds a touch high as well. It should probably feel cosy being here in the hotel room with it like that outside, but it doesn't.

I washed some underwear in the sink maybe three days ago. The damn stuff still isn't dry. How the hell is that possible? Desert expeditions should just take damp underwear with them instead of carting great quantities of liquid water about.

Mon, 7:25pm. After the usual struggle to get up, including the now semi-customary attempt of the cleaner to get in, I left the hotel about 11am. I walked over to Rano Kao. The route was easy to find but it seemed a hell of a long way and most of it was uphill. I did hope to record how far I walked, but my GPS played up. My pedometer tells me (fairly reliably I think) I did a bit over 4h's "aerobic" (which I interpret as 'fairly continuous and moderately fast', based on experience, despite the description in the manual) walking in total today. That includes maybe 30-60 minutes walking between the hotel and town, assuming that was continuous enough to be included.

The trail comes out at a viewpoint we had stopped at on the tour yesterday. Just before I got to the top I saw the first person I'd seen since leaving the road, and it turned out to be a Canadian guy I had met on the first two days I was on the tour. (I have subsequently seen, but not spoken to him, twice more today.) He was just coming back - he had walked round the right side of the crater already when I first met him, and had been walking round the less advertised left side.

There were about three other people just behind him, then I saw no one else until I was just leaving to go back into town, so I had the place pretty much to myself, which was cool. There was a solitary cow on the left hand trail around the crater, which kept mooing before I saw it, but I think it was scared of me and after it being in sight for maybe five minutes it disappeared and I neither saw nor heard it again.

There was quite a bit of wind and not too much sun as I walked up to the viewpoint but it was still quite warm and I was glad of the wind. I did the walk round the right side of the crater and encountered some quite fierce winds, presumably due to lack of shelter. You can't walk all the way round, apart from anything else there is a big 'bite' out of the crater on the sea-side. So I doubled back to the top of the trail and did the much longer and less advertised walk round the left side, as far as I was allowed. Bits of this path seemed decidedly close to the sloping edge, but fortunately the wind seemed to die down and it was OK. I couldn't get right round to the 'bite' as there were signs saying (in English and Spanish)'falling cliffs' and 'you have approached a dangerous zone' (yeah, I approached it because a) no earlier signs told me not to and b) I wanted to read this sign). Apparently there were some mass rockfalls in 2007.

The crater is 1.6km in diameter and 200m deep, the lagoon in the bottom is 12m deep. (I may have given mangled figures yesterday, I believe these are correct as they came from signs around the crater.) It is covered in floating reeds which according to one information board I saw can be walked on in places. That would be so cool, but you are not allowed inside the crater at all, let alone onto the surface of the lake.

Simple mathematics says that it would be a 5km walk around the circumference of the crater. I must have done at least that (even ignoring the walk up there and back), since although I couldn't walk the complete circumference I did the bit I could twice (out, can't go further, back). And especially on the left side (I use these terms relative to the path up to the viewpoint) the path frequently strays away from the crater rim (while, as noted, at a few points coming perilously close), which must increase the distance. I might guess I did about 7-8km around the rim. And maybe about 4km each way up and down. (My GPS got up to about 4km before it turned itself off.)

Even the walk back down the trail was exhausting, I was knackered by this point and although it was downhill it seemed to take ages. The path was hard enough and steep enough that I couldn't let gravity just take me as it hurt my knees to walk at that speed. I could hardly believe I'd walked up the damn thing as I was coming down.

I walked past the cave with the birdman paintings we saw on the tour yesterday on the way out to the viewpoint and back, but on the way out I wanted to get a move on and on the way back I was too knackered and figured I'd already seen it and it just wasn't that cool. (Similarly, I could have gone a tiny bit further than I did on the right hand trail and continued on to Orongo, but having already seen that and wanting to do the left side I turned back as the path veered away from the crater edge.)

Anyway, all pretty cool if tiring. I am struck that a lot of the time I wasn't looking at the crater as I was concentrating on the path and feeling a bit knackered. I mean, I did keep looking at the thing and took loads of photos, but even so. This does make me think about the business of hiking round Torres del Paine national park. I imagine you feel more 'there', but you perhaps don't appreciate the scenery in the same way I did going round on a bus tour. I'm sure you do get to appreciate it, but you must also look at stuff and think "hell, I've got to walk over/around that bugger to get to the next place" :-). I'm quite glad I got both variations on Rano Kao. It was probably cooler today to be there on my own spending loads of time, but maybe there was something to be said for the 'easy access' of the tour.

I think I've made a reasonable stab at seeing stuff here. For what it's worth, I don't think I've seen a moai today or yesterday (maybe there was a knocked down one of the tour yesterday, but I am not so sure). But (to quote one of the guide books) I "spent some time alone with the moai" on my first day here, and I'm glad I went back to Rano Kao today.

(Well, there are pseudo-moai all over the place, including a couple on the road the hotel is on next to the airport, but for all I know they are modern variations. They don't really look like the real things, and even if they are they don't have the same kind of setting.)

Oh, I had a quick look at my e-book earlier. I had noticed a while ago a sort of 'crosshair' formed on the screen by a couple of non-functioning rows and columns of pixels, it now has more. I find this a bit crap. I mean, I'm not treating it with kid gloves, but it has been fairly reasonably packed in my hand luggage most of the time. My laptop is fine having been treated exactly the same, although it arguably has a thicker case, and of course it's diferent display technology. I think the display is still readable (the battery appears to be nearly dead, so I didn't look at it for long) if a bit crap. This may give me an excuse to get a new improved model in a few months' time, but I know this one wasn't cheap and it's a bit of a pisser it's so un-robust.

Mon 8pm. I was a bit concerned earlier that when I check out they might ask me to pay, which I think I already did when I booked. But I just looked back over my notes of what I've spent and I can see I made a note about paying for the flights but not that I paid for the hotel. But I could swear I did. They kept the voucher I'd printed out when I checked in so I can no longer examine it. I hope the wifi will be working again tonight so I can check, but I am not overly optimistic. (There was a guy fiddling with cables in a trench when I got back about 4pm though, which may or may not be related to the wifi/internet problem at the hotel.) I suppose if I can't check I will just have to see what they say when I check out and if push comes to shove pay again and try to reclaim the extra payment when I'm back in the UK. That sounds really awkward though, but fingers crossed it will be OK.

Not really looking forward to tomorrow or most of the day after. Although I fly at 1pm tomorrow I have to check out by 10am and so will just end up sat at the airport all morning, then on a plane, then I have to drag myself over to the centre of Santiago. I don't expect to get to the hostel (I have the cheapest I could find, as it's such a brief stay, from memory it's about GBP14 with a shared bathroom) til 9pm or maybe 10pm, then although I may go out regardless, I have to be out by about 8am since I must be at the airport by 10am, then I have the flight to Buenos Aires. There won't really be anything except pure travelling until mid-late afternoon on Wednesday. (I can imagine I will end up going out for a couple of beers tomorrow night, even though I probably ought to take the opportunity to have a night completely off. We will see I guess. Even if I do it's still a bit crap.)

It occurred to me it might almost have been better to spend the night at Santiago airport. But I've never done that before and it would be well over 12h there. More to the point, nowadays the airport isn't 'normal' (the functioning bits all being in tents in the car park) and I doubt you can really stay there overnight even if you want to.

Oh, I am down at Tavake again. I ate here, I was going to eat at Aringa Ora but it looks like it's shut today (I passed it about 6:15pm and it was shut, it was shut at 3:30pm-ish when I got back from the walk tho I assumed that was just the afternoon, but I was eating there by 6pm yesterday so if it was open it should have been open when I passed it tonight.) I brought my key out with me but I don't know how late I will be out.

Mon, 10:30pm. Bit quiet here though the music is still playing, I just went inside to check they were still open and get another beer. The owner (?), who appears to be a man in (relatively unostentatious) drag (seriously - my Bradt guide does mention "the island's token camp bitch" in connection with this bar, presumably referring to him) just spoke to me at my table and said they are open til 1am every night. (I had already been told they were open til 1am when here a few nights ago, but I wasn't sure if that was just at the weekend.) He was nice enough to compliment me on my Spanish. He seems a decent enough chap. (Down, Chubbard/Ives.)

I fear I may have exaggerated the size of the cockroaches here in saying they are two inches long. I haven't a ruler handy, but they may be an inch and a half. Men always exaggerate small measurements in inches I guess. They are comparable to the ones I've seen in Mexico, for what that might be worth.

Not that I have seen any just here tonight, but I am reminded by a smallish flying insect that they have biggish dragonflies here (as, if I didn't say at the time, they do in San Pedro de Atacama). I can't help thinking they are very cool. We probably have them nearly as large in the UK, but I have never seen one there. (I am mainly certain they exist as my Dad found one on the driveway and took a fairly nice picture of it.) They are the hummingbirds of the insect world, I find their ability to hover frankly amazing. Unlike most insects I wish one would land on or near me so I can have a good look, but they never do. If one did I'd doubtless frighten it off trying to get my camera out of my pocket anyway.

A couple has turned up and sat at another table outside, which despite the probable-owner's reassurance about 1am closing is nice. (There was a solitary old bloke sat at a table when I went inside to see if they were still open, I think that's the extent of the custom at present.)

I am vaguely tempted to push it slightly (til midnight, say) tonight. There's no way I'm going to be significantly drunk by then, I don't have to check out til 10am so getting up at 9 (ideally) or 9:30 (in practice, regardless of what time I go to bed) would be fine and give me plenty of sleep, and if I'm slightly tired it can only help me sleep on the plane. I'm already out past close of reception at the hotel anyway. Even if I need to argue about payment tomorrow (which I can't, lacking hard evidence) that can take place after 10am. The airport, as I already bitterly remarked, is 450m walk from the hotel and it's an internal flight at 1pm, so there is little danger of a major panic to get to the airport in time.

An Australian woman was talking to the guide on the tour yesterday and said that if she had to leave Australia to live in Buenos Aires or Easter Island, she would come here. (I assume the implication was that she also liked BA and it would be second choice.) While it is undeniably cool to visit, I couldn't imagine living here. I don't think I could handle even a village in the UK, the isolation and (I am imagining at this point, of course) small-town atmosphere of everyone knowing everyone would do my head in. I could vaguely imagine exiling myself in somewhere like Santiago, but despite (and perhaps because) growing up in a small town (even that being about four times the size of Hanga Roa, which has essentially the entire population of the island), I think I'm an urban kind of person. Yeah, it can be a bit unfriendly and lonely in a way, but it seems better than the alternatives.

If I haven't made the observation before, every time I am asked to fill in my details in a hotel or do it voluntarily in a visitor's book, I am reminded of Mark Twain's caustic remarks about Americans filling in such things in the local language. I can never make my mind up if I should write 'British' or 'Britanico' for my nationality, and similarly with my profession. (I never know why they ask for your profession, but they do. Kevin in La Paz told about a guy he met who always wrote 'tourist' for his profession.) I don't do it out of a sense of pretentiousness and on the one hand it fits with my attempts to speak the language, but on the other hand there is Mark Twain sneering from beyond the grave at the back of my mind.

Easter Island, part 7

Sun, 7:45pm. I kept saying I walked west earlier, I meant east. Hanga Roa is at the SW edge of the triangular island. I think you'd need to be Jesus to walk more than a km or two west of the hotel.

Re-read a few of the blog posts (the ones I had handy on my phone) last night while falling asleep and been doing the same just now. Already some of the stuff just a few weeks ago has receded into hazy memory. I'm glad I'm writing all this shit down, I enjoyed re-reading it even if the majority of it is doubtless tedious as hell to the casual reader, if any exist.

In principle I could be writing this blog deliberately restricting myself to relatively exciting events and with a view to making it interesting to someone else, but I'm too selfish and verbose to try.

Sun, 9pm. Still here. Just ordered a last beer (my fifth) as I need to be back at the hotel by 10. Should be cool. Will get a cab back though it rankles a bit as it's about 5-10 mins walk down the road, but it's raining, the road is AFAIK unlit and I am racing the clock. Sure it will still cost 1500 even though I'm half way there. The downside of not having meters (I do generally prefer places where you arrange a flat fare up front). Just heard "Nessun Dorma" from the TV in the bar (I am out on the terrace), which was slightly odd somehow.

Sun, 9:45pm. Just got back to the hotel. At about 9:30 I paid the bill and then asked them to call me a taxi. (I was vaguely tempted to stay out, but the closing of reception loomed and I also felt I should try to have a quiet-ish night.) The waitress said (I have to assume honestly, odd as it sounds, I think I'm a pretty good customer there for all the fact it's not very matey and nowhere else has declined to do this for me) they had no telephone. So I figured I'd have to walk it. Fortunately the rain is not too heavy.

The bar is on the corner. As I left and turned onto the street the hotel is on, three dogs (two large and one small) affiliated with the bar started barking their fucking heads off. For fuck's sake, I had been stroking two of the cunts at my table an hour or so earlier (and then hadn't seen them since). The little bastard (which I hadn't stroked, purely because it never came near me) even got out onto the street and was barking at me. Just what I fucking needed at the start of the walk home.

I knew exactly where I was going but I got my GPS out, partly for the comfort of knowing exactly how far I had to go and partly to avoid the risk (unlikely) of missing the hotel entrance. It was less than 800m. Fortunately there was quite a lot of traffic (i.e. headlights) and the road is not totally unlit, though I wouldn't fancy walking it at 3am. Also no further dogs encountered at all, not even as barking fuckers in gardens, after I left the bar. The airport was lit up and a plane was on the runway, I guess that makes sense as I arrived about this time and I had heard the thing land about 8:30/9pm. I thought I could pop onto the airport forecourt and get a cab, but as it was going OK and I resented paying CLP1500 for what is (by GPS) a 450m journey I reserved that as a fallback in case some canine fucker should impede my progress.

(So, yeah, when I arrived I paid 2000 when asked for 1500 to be driven 450m. FOUR HUNDRED AND FIFTY FUCKING METRES FOR NEARLY TWO QUID, even ignoring the fact I stupidly gave the guy an extra 500.)

I asked at reception if the internet was working, the woman said no, something I didn't understand the name of was broken. I noticed the rack rate tariff for a single room is USD125/night, so I doubt I'm paying USD140 as I said, but I also doubt I'm paying any less than USD125. Not cheap and you'd think they might put some effort in to get the whatever-it-is fixed ASAP. This is my fifth night, I think, and it hasn't worked since I arrived. I know we're on a fucking remote island but a) five fucking days! b) I am sure there is some shop selling whatevers on the island and c) at these prices, could it perhaps be possible to keep a spare? I keep seeing people sat outside presumably cheaper hostels on the main street (i.e. more central) with laptops presumably surfing away. Honestly, for me the primary amenity a hotel or hostel can provide after a bed is working wi-fi.

Anyway. I shall dither away another hour or two and try to get to bed earlyish so I have time to do that walk towards the volcano (and maybe get a bit of 'quality time' up by the crater rim on my own) tomorrow.

Easter Island, part 6

Sat, 11pm. I do wonder if I am showing a deplorable lack of spirit, adventurousness and/or testosterone in not immediately forming plans to visit that club ("Lingerie! Phooar!") and take my chances tomorrow morning. But to be honest it has little appeal, I am as a general rule only too open to any prospect of continued drinking and I think I've done my modest share of late nights on the trip so far, including a couple of clubs, and I'm not having to fight particularly hard to suppress an urge to go. I don't know what the place is called, either. :-) But joking aside, I regard that as a mere technicality, it appeals to me not one iota under the circumstances. Based on my general attitude to strip clubs in London (and this is presumably tamer (I merely harp on the "lingerie" theme as the guy mentioned it), naffer and probably - given my general experience of the island - pricier), I doubt it would appeal much under any circumstances.

Sat, 11:55pm. I will have at least one more beer I think. It's pissing it down again and has been for a while. I must have been lucky to catch a lull on my walk here from Tavake. (I went to the bog just before I left and remembering thinking "fuck, it's raining heavily now just as I want to leave", so it was very well timed.) I don't care now as I will be getting a cab back of course (CLP1500 is insane for about a three minute trip, but it's not a huge amount in absolute terms and as I have observed numerous times already this is clearly an expensive place. I haven't had a beer - 350ml can - for less than CLP1500 (it's 2000 here), whereas just about everywhere in mainland Chile you could get a litre for (my memory is a bit hazy, not due to beer, just one of those things) 1500/2000/3000 depending on the kind of place it was.

I paid CLP8200 with tip for the milanesa and chips and a small can of diet coke earlier, I'm sure that would weigh in around five or six thousand on the mainland tops in an otherwise similar bar/restaurant. Maybe I delude myself but I think the feeling of priciness here is real.

Oh, we stopped at a minimarket at the beginning of the tour today to give us a chance to buy stuff. No doubt they get a backhander. I bought some more snacks, damned expensive as always, to go with my lunch, and a big bottle of diet coke which was at least cold and retained a degree of that refreshing property throughout the day. There was a sticker by the counter with a Chilean government logo saying (in Spanish, I write in English recollecting my bad mental translation at the time) "Cook seafood for five minutes, lemon juice doesn't kill bacteria (? I guessed the last word, but the gist was clear from context)". Clearly this is hinting at dodgy ceviche. I doubt there's anything peculiar to Easter Island about that warning, but it does somehow make me less inclined than I already was to try ordering any here.

The palm tree outside remains silhouetted as earlier. I would have expected the sky to darken and render it invisible but for whatever reason (presumably town lights) the sky in that direction at least remains as it was.

Sun, 12:40am. Why I have been using 12h clock for these blog entries I don't know, given my general preference for 24h clock. I suspect I felt writing things like 'Sun, 00:40' would be too wankily militaristic, I feel a bit stupidly sad putting the day in as it is but when I'm sending these posts at irregular 24h intervals not coinciding with midnight I felt it would be clearer. (My casual readers, if any can be arsed with this tedious crap, won't care, but I might/will when I read them in the future.) Just ordered another beer, am fairly sober but I think this will be the last. I have no idea when they close but I do have a 9:40 start which is a slight concern even if I hadn't touched a drop of alcohol. I am not enormously worried about oversleeping at this rate but still, it's OK here but by no means a great night and I've pushed it enough.

If the wi-fi doesn't work tomorrow I may have to try an internet cafe tomorrow evening, assuming they are open on Sunday late-ish. (The tour is only the morning, but I vaguely hope to do a walk - annoyingly to the same place as the tour - in the afternoon.)

Quite apart from the expense, I don't like drinking in 350ml units. It feels like I've finished the beer as soon as I've started it. If a half-litre don't satisfy, how much worse is 350ml? I know it's a bit more, but it's not dissimilar to the way a half pint back home always seems like a far smaller, less worthwhile drink than a pint, disproportionate to its actual volume.

Sat 1:15am. 8000 for the beers, 800 service charge on the bill. Not having a 10000 note handy I've paid 9000 and don't expect change. Asked them to call me a cab. Two couples here apart from me, I just saw the barstaff mixing a drink but I suspect they will shut soon, though whether that's because people leave to go to clubs at this time or vice versa I don't know. I am not inclined to push it for all the reasons mentioned earlier.

Sun, 1:20am. Just got back. The English-speaking waitress told the cab driver where to take me, which was nice, but I'm not quite such an English-only muppet as to need it. I said "1500?" to the driver and he said "at this time, 2000" (in Spanish). I guess it probably is later than I've taken a cab back before and it's about 75p more and as I keep saying it's expensive here but still. His hourly rate must be getting on for what I earn contracting in London. :-) 2000 was exactly how much Chilean cash I had in my wallet, in some sense I am broke as I write this in my hotel room. (Me being me, I have a considerable quantity of additional cash stashed about my person, but it would have been awkward to have to dredge it out, so still kind of lucky.) Man it is expensive here (did I say that already?). Without adding it up, I had CLP30000-40000 in my wallet this morning and it's all gone. Doing bad mental arithmetic rather than digging out the calculator function on here (all these posts ar
e from my phone, given the lack of wi-fi) that's about 30 quid in a day, for snacks, entry to some park place, a modest meal and a bit over 3.5 pints of beer. (Inconsistently, I dredged the calculator out for the beer can-to-pint conversion.) I guess you could economise a bit, and if you were in some cheap-but-central hostel the taxi might not arise, but I am a bit surprised my "shoestring" guide doesn't just have a one line entry for Easter Island: "You can't afford it." Or maybe it could stretch to: "Do the tours. Build up your body fat before you come and fast on the island. Sleep 14h a day. You can't afford anything else."

Anyway, a perhaps ill-advised (purely given the time, I am fairly sober if broke) shower and then to bed.

1:50am. I just noticed there is a sheet on the bed. For the last few nights I just slept under the counterpane, and to be fair that was fine. I half suspect the sheet wasn't there before, the tour guide (making crap conversation) as she picked me up this morning did say it had been cold last night. Looking at the bed more closely there is also an extra sheet on the bottom. Before you could see the mattress on either side of some padded blanket thing covering it, now there is a UK-style (for want of a better phrase) sheet covering the whole mattress. For whatever reason they have made it up differently today. Anyway, enough observing the bed, time to sleep in it and fingers crossed for getting up OK in the morning...

Sun, 9:35am. Woken up by a full bladder about 9, stayed in bed til 9:15ish and just got to reception. A probably-French guy and the presumably local receptionist bloke are discussing (in English) how the island was populated. A slightly interesting topic but I would really rather not have to listen to it.

Sun 1:50pm. Having an arguably unnecessary and time-wasting lunch. The tour was fairly good, I got my first genuine "wow" moment on seeing the (thankfully un-hyped) crater of Rano Kao. We also visited the nearby ceremonial village (Orongo?) and some cave on the coast with not terribly visible paintings in (but the view was pretty cool anyway).

I managed to get into an internet cafe and have booked a hostel in Santiago for Tuesday night (very near the apartments I have stayed in before, i.e. central, there seemed no choice, so getting there and back from the airport is likely to be pricey or time consuming, and I don't have much time as I have to be at the airport at 10amish at the latest) and a serviced apartment in Buenos Aires for 6 nights. I did wonder if 6 nights was overdoing it when I only have 4 weeks for Argentina and maybe a a bit of Uruguay, but I figure I should see the city properly.

Not sure what I will do this afternoon. It's overcast and spitting very slightly which seems to argue against a walk anywhere, but I may chance it. I think I won't walk over to the volcano we went to this morning, I may do it tomorrow but twice in one day is probably pushing it. I may head west down the road the hotel is on and just see what I come across. I should probably consult a map after lunch though and see if there's anything in that direction I have a chance of reaching.

Sun, 2:30pm. Well. As I left the restaurant I realised I'd lost my cap. To cut a long story shorter, earlier I had stopped in at another restaurant, looked at the menu and left as it looked crap. I realised I'd probably left it there. I just went back and I had, and I've now got it, which is nice. But one of the staff gave me a little mini lecture about how I should have said I was leaving. I mean, WTF? I hadn't ordered anything. Maybe in some really abstract sense it's slightly rude but fuck it, we're not friends and it's not like I spat in their faces and then left. There was no one around so I just walked out without seeking anyone to tell I was leaving. (I also told the waitress when she tried to trap me with a drink order while I was studying the menu that I might not want to eat so I wouldn't order a drink yet, now I think about it.) So anyway, I don't know whether to feel grateful I got my cap back (it's decidedly the worse for wear these days and I do have another with me) or
aggrieved at being lectured. (The guy said something I didn't catch about having seen me or something. I could swear he also said "you be good" in English, but at the same time I can hardly believe it.) I probably wouldn't have given them any money anyway, but as it was there was no way I was going to.

Sun, 5:55pm. Back at Aringa Ora or whatever that restaurant on the corner with the street my hotel on is called. Been for a walk west (covered the entire length of the 3.5km runway, as the guides have pointed out twice NASA paid to extend it in '86 as an emergency landing place for the shuttle, perhaps more interestingly Sao Paulo also has a long enough runway for the shuttle according to one of the guides) and out past there. Didn't really see any obvious archaeological sites although there was some sort of wall-y thing which I didn't bother walking up close to, but the view was quite good and it was fairly peaceful. Walked 11km since I got my lecture earlier, though a good 2-3km of that at least is probably on 'familiar' territory in the town and out to the hotel, and since I just turned round and walked back the way I came you can halve the remainder to determine how far I actually penetrated out into the wilds. I didn't push it, the last thing I wanted was to be miles away, knack
ered and having to walk all the way back.

Was vaguely tempted to just go back to the hotel for the night, but I think it would be too unspeakably dull. I have compromised on coming here, having a ham and cheese sandwich as a cheap 'dinner' (I am not that hungry anyway) and a few beers and will probably try to be back at the hotel before dark, and almost certainly (especially as reception has my key) before 10pm for an earlyish night.

Easter Island, part 5

Fri, 10:55pm. I think I'm losing it (and I only just started my third small beer). There are two semi-stray dogs here, both of which seem very friendly (to me I mean). One is much bigger than the other. They are now in the bushes nearby and although they aren't at it, there was a straddling movement for a second or two. (I am assuming this was sexual rather than some canine domination ritual, I know little about dogs.) The big one was on top. The reason I say I'm losing it is that I thought "that makes sense, the bigger one can fit over the smaller one" rather than "ah, the bigger one must be male". I mean, there are considerations beyond pure convenience to consider there...

They are getting a bit boisterous (in a general way, not sexually!) now and the owners have just sort of separated them. The little white one seems to be called "Blanca". Maybe they are owned, although they may just have given them names.

Fri, 11:20pm. There are a couple of biggish cockroaches scuttling around. (I am sat on the terrace, so I don't think this reflects badly on the bar.) They weren't bothering me until the small white dog turned one over and it lay there kicking its legs on its back. In the end - call me a sap - I flicked it upright with a handy menu. But although I don't have a massive problem with the damn things - they're infinitely preferable to spiders - I now have a nasty vision of one climbing up inside my trouser leg. I suspect they are not overly prone to do that, but it's not a pleasant thought. (I now observe one on a nearby wall, so I suspect they're capable of it, although I already did suspect that.) I guess most people would just have trodden on the fuckers but the idea sickens me.

I do wonder how they compare to the British article in size. I've never seen one in the UK. I guess in the UK you only get them in dirty houses, here they're more a fact of life.

11:30pm. Just ordered another beer which I think will be my last. I'm not remotely drunk - they're 350ml cans and this is only four - but that's probably a good thing and I do have to be up earlyish. Can't help having nagging doubts about getting back to the hotel and getting in but it should be fine.

Fri, 11:55pm. 13200, call it 15000 with tip. Seems OKish, by local standards, I can't believe how much it was the other day for the meal with two beers and two juices. Asked them to call me a cab. (I wonder if the old joke works in Spanish, I suspect it does, the verb being 'llamar' in both cases as I understand it, I must ask a native speaker next time I get a chance.)

Sat, 12:05am. Back at the hotel, no problem. The cab turned up within about a minute of being called, I guess it's not too surprising in a place this size. We passed Marau on the way back, a few people in there but nothing like last night. A bit odd given it's Friday. Maybe it's too early for it to be busy tonight, or maybe by this time the local drinking population have mostly hied it to a club. I shall probably never know. I may go there tomorrow night and see what happens, I still have a 9:40am start on Sunday but it's only a half day and I can certainly cope with being out as late as I was tonight as it's only a half day tour on Sunday (though I hope to do a bit of walking in the afternoon). I just may get some clue as to the local population's plans from that, even if I don't join in it would be interesting to know.

(Oh, just to water down my statements earlier, I think I was the only customer at that place tonight. The waiter told me they were open til 1am, and while we hardly talked outside of business, I must admit he didn't seem particularly unfriendly or to resent my interrupting his web browsing to ask for another beer.)

Anyway, a quick shower and then to bed.

Sat, 9:50am. Dragged myself out of bed about 9:15 and now waiting out at the front of the hote by reception to be picked upl. Some people are checking out and seem to be saying something about not having a flight. It's far from clear.

Guy at reception just saw me writing this on my phone and asked me in English if I 'had internet'. It transpires that they do apparently have wi-fi here, although I think they have to turn it on explicitly for some reason (maybe it's something to do with the way internet access is billed out here). I told him I didn't need it now but apparently if I ask later I can get wi-fi access. That will save me having to do the round of the net cafes again when I finish the tour, assuming it works.

(I did ask - in Spanish - at reception yesterday afternoon and I was told they had 'a computer' but it didn't work. So this is a step up.)

Just been interrupted by being collected for the trip. Was a bit freaked out that the woman who turned up spoke Rapa Nui (I assume, I caught the word 'iorana', 'hello') to the nearby hotel staff. Not exactly surprising but I do find it strangely disconcerting. My shoestring guide implies you should use a few words with the locals but I figured that would be patronsing when I don't actuallly speak the language, even at the 'a beer please' level, and my Bradt guide doesn't imply any such thing.

Sat 3:45pm. Tour fairly interesting today. We are technically still on it, they have brought us to one of, if memory serves, the two beaches on the island. We have an hour here, well, 45 minutes now. I doubt I would have anyway, but no one told me to bring any appropriate clothing so I won't be going in. So I am just killing time here until we are due to return to Hanga Roa. A bit like Pan de Azucar beach in Chile I guess.

We went to the place where the statues were quarried out where there are loads of unfinished ones lying around. Also a few other places with statues left toppled over and where they have been reconstructed. The names totally escape me but in theory I have photographs of them. Have taken an insane number of photos of course.

In a strange way the toppled statues are more appealing. I think it's because they seem a bit more 'authentic' than the ones which have been set back upright.

Sat, 4:50pm. Just got dropped off back at the hotel. Asked at reception if the wi-fi was working and told not yet. It was some woman, it's a shame the bloke who told me this morning I could use it wasn't there. Still, there is a slim chance it will start to work shortly. I probably won't drag myself off to an internet cafe tonight, although it would be good to get these damn accommodation bookings sorted out. Both are a bit tricky - Santiago because I need cheap but as near the airport as possible, Buenos Aires because I want to get somewhere 'comfortable', preferably a serviced apartment, but know nothing about the city except that Cristian vaguely recommended the Palermo district. I guess I could put in a few minutes with my guide book now, since I probably won't go out for dinner and drinks til about 7. On the other hand, the only guide I have covering Argentina is my shoestring guide, and I suspect its budget-conscious nature may skew things. Still, I suppose any idea I obtain ab
out the city is an improvement on my current knowledge.

Sat, 8:30pm. It started to rain about 6:30pm. Walked over to the restaurant on the corner at about 7:30pm, forgetting my damn cap. Had a milanesa de pollo and chips there, then walked practically the entire damn length of the main street to come back to Tavake. Just got here, vague plan is to stay here for a few and maybe pop into that 'proper' bar at about 10 or 11. Moderately damp but it could be worse. Shame about the cap. They are playing Morrissey's "I just want to see the boy happy" on the radio here, which is kind of a nice surprise.

Sat 8:45pm. I hate to say this, but there's a bloke sat at the next table (it's very quiet here) on his own who seems to be enjoying the music just a bit too much (though he seems to have toned it down lately) and he's creeping me out in some strange way. I'm sure I have been that guy, which is why I feel bad saying it, but still. I just hope he doesn't talk to me.

Oh shit, he just called over to some bloke at a nearby table and asked where he's from, i.e. he's not talking to a mate and he may talk to me. He clearly speaks English at least a bit so I can't be uncommunicative and blame it on not speaking much Spanish. Fuck fuck fuck. Come on Stevie boy, you can do it, pretend you're stood at a busy bar and magically invisible to the bar staff. Turn that talent to good use.

Oh, as I was walking over from the hotel to the restaurant (in the rain, remember), I encountered the first complete bastard of a dog I've seen on the island. Of of nowhere there was this mad barking right in my fucking left ear. Turned out a flat-bed lorry was going past with two dogs in the back and one of the fuckers was going bananas in what struck me as a vaguely menacing way. The damn lorry slowed down to turn a corner just up ahead and I had visions of the fucking thing jumping out. But it didn't.

Sat 9:05pm. So far so good and some bloke has just pulled up a chair at his table so maybe I'm off the hook.

It's not really cold but I'm just that tiny bit damp which makes all the difference to how you feel. I may have to go in at this rate, though I'd rather not.

Oh, one reason I didn't want to get up this morning was that it was, or I imagined it would be, cold in the room. As best I can remember it wasn't boiling but then it hardly ever seems warm anywhere when you get out of bed. In any case you can't win, as it was far too warm for me at times during the day.

Shit. My fleece is damp enough that putting it on makes things worse. I will persevere with it on the offchance it improves. I seem to recall wool is supposed to have some special properties which allow it to help you retain heat when damp, and maybe whatever material the fleece is made of shares the same properties. It may even be made of wool for all I know, though probably not as it isn't itchy.

Sat 10:30pm. No problem with blokey. Had a couple down at Tavake but it was a bit dead, walked down the street to Marou. A few of the places down the street seemed a bit more lively than Tavake but I figured I'd come here as it's more of a bar. Maybe 20 other people here, so there's a bit more atmosphere. The waitress replied to my request for a beer in English, which always throws me. It had at least more or less stopped raining a minute or two before I left, so I didn't get any wetter coming here.

There were a couple of cats at the statue quarry place we went to earlier. A nice change from just seeing dogs. I stroked one a bit, and when we had lunch in the picnic area round at the back there was a black one running round miaowing under the tables.

I am sat on the terrace here and through an opening in the wall there is a single palm tree silhouetted against the almost dark sky. That is quite picturesque I must admit, I whipped my camera out but I don't think it has come out, the image on the camera's own screen just looks black, even with a 1/15 second exposure.

It's pretty green here. In places it looks tropical but in other places, at least to my non-tree-distinguishing eye, you could believe you were in some English country lane.

(Just tried a couple of doubtless shaky 4s exposures, I don't think they worked either but they just may look OK on a proper screen and if I can be bothered they just may be manipulable into showing something approximating what I am seeing.)

Sat, 10:45pm. Californian waiter just came past, evidently off-duty, and spoke (in English) to a group of guys at the next table. Apparently there is a new disco opening (out down the road next to the airport, which is where my hotel is and my 2005 Bradt guide says there are two clubs down there - way past the hotel I suspect, but on the same road, not that it matters as it would be a cab job anuway) which has lingerie modelling on tonight (that's how he described it, without any obvious indication he was using that description as a joke, which sounds slightly odd but still). He said it gets going about 2am and then something about how they should get a cab down there at 1am. I have no plan to go - 9:40am start making even a 1am visit a bit dubious, plus it sounds a bit naff to be honest, especially as I'm on my own, and I suspect (whether it's meant to be or not) it will be about as titillating as a cheap strip club in London, i.e. not very, even if I was looking titillation - but a
t least I do know to a certain extent 'what people are doing' this Saturday night.

Easter Island, part 4

Fri, 12:55am. It occurs to me (post-shower) that if the body of the hotel in which my room is located is accessible round that corner, were I merely to take my key out with me, any inconvenience on anyone else's part could be dispensed with, assuming they keep the lights on outside all night anyway. The thought vaguely tempts me to the path of honesty with regard to speaking to reception tomorrow, well, today.

I may as well say at this point that the rooms are in some buildings around a swimming pool, which I doubt is in regular use, although who knows. Maybe in high season. All very elegant I'm sure. I could pay half the money and do without a pool I wouldn't dare to ask about using even if I could swim, though.

Fri 1pm. Got up stupidly late again. No big deal. I am having breakfast/lunch at the restuarant I went to last night. I think most of the tour offices will be shut for lunch til 3pm anyway. I will wander up that way after I've eaten and if they are I hope I will be able to fill in time at an internet cafe booking accommodation in Santiago/Buenos Aires.

I may try the second half of that walk I stumbled on yesterday afterwards, time and weather permitting, although glacing at a map in one of my guide books earlier I suspect it's further than you'd think. On the other hand, the board advertising the walk said 2.5h, not particularly difficult. Time permitting we shall see.

I vaguely plan to be demanding with the tour company and see what they can sort me out with to make the use of the three full days I have left after today. I suspect this won't happen though.

Feeling much better today.

Fri 2:20pm. Went into Kia-Koe tours, partly because they were open and partly because the shoestring guide recommends them. Have paid CLP50,000 for a half day tour this afternoon, full day tomorrow and half day Sunday morning. I opted out of paying USD18 (I wish people would stop quoting me prices in dollars, I am not American, I don't have a good feel for dollar value, I don't have any dollars but I do have, shock horror, the LOCAL CURRENCY) for a box lunch on the full day tour as my Bradt guide says it's a rip off. I will have to buy something tonight.

The woman in there seemed slightly unhelpful but maybe I imagined it. She kept not understanding my English intermittently and I resorted to very bad Spanish. It was all just a bit awkward. (I started in Spanish but she obviously noticed I was not a native speaker and switched to English.)

Had to come and buy a diet coke I don't want (2200 with tip, fucking hell, that's nearly THREE QUID for a can of coke) just so I can use a bog. I should have gone at the restaurant but I couldn't find it and the probably-staff glared at me so much I didn't like to ask. Fuckers. I would have asked but it's practically impossible to tell who's staff and who isn't in these places.

Tour this afternoon is at 3pm. I am being picked up at the hotel at 9:40am tomorrow and Sunday but today I said I'd rather go to their office as it wasn't worth the hassle of going back to the hotel.

I worry a bit I have over-booked myself but fuck it, at least this way I don't waste this afternoon and I am free Sunday afternoon and Monday to do 'something else'. I had to do the tours I guess really and while I could have shopped round how would I really be able to judge good v bad? At least this company has been recommended in one of my guide books.

Fri 8pm. Tour finished about six, bought some very basic snacks (biscuits and a couple of apples, and two bottles of water) from a frankly depressing and desolate supermarket and lugged them back to the hotel. Was going to book accommodation while in town but since two internet cafes I could see were both full and I hate waiting I figured I'd leave it.

Come into town for something to eat and a few beers. The receptionist said they shut at 10pm but offered to leave the key on the windowsill again, I asked if I could bring it out with me and I have, it seemed safer.

Was vaguely planning to try ceviche (not for the first time) but I can't find anywhere I can bring myself to order it. Some places just look too pretentious, I sat outside another place for a few minutes without attracting any attention. Back at the place I ate here my first morning (Tavake). They do ceviche here but it's more expensive than beef or chicken, which somehow seems off. Plus - despite what that woman I met in Santiago the other Saturday told me - I bet it comes with some sort of foul sauce or mayonnaise. I may ask the waiter, if he ever comes over. At least I have seen a waiter here.

I don't plan to be out super late and according to the price list outside the beer here is CLP1500 a can, so I may see how long I can stick on here after eating instead of going back to Marou (last night's bar). It was pricey there and not particularly and I don't want to go back too often.

I think the ceviche can fuck off. I just can't be bothered to look like an idiot asking and there will doubtless be some one ingredient whose name I don't recognise and therefore have to assume indicates something foul. I may compromise on fish with rice, depending on how the fish is cooked. I can handle asking that.

I should maybe ask about the ceviche but (maybe it's just in my head) there's something about this place (I mean the island, not this particular restaurant) that doesn't feel friendly. I think I'd ask in a 'normal' restaurant in a city, but at these kind of little places I don't get the right feeling. You might naively expect they'd be more helpful, but I get/imagine this 'fuck you, take it or leave it' sort of feeling. I suspect I am imagining this but who knows.

The tour was fairly good, if a bit short, and the guide fairly informative. We went to some place where the top part of the statues was quarried out, then to some place where there are 7 statues facing out to sea (which none of the others do apparently, I assume there is a way to tell which way a toppled statue was facing when they reconstruct stuff), then to some sort of cave, apparently the biggest on the island. There were a few too many cobwebs around in the cave for my taste, but it was OK in the end, I didn't see anything. I took photos of all the signs so in theory those would give the proper local and hence not very memorable names of the places I went.

Fri, 9pm. Not a bad meal anyway. Some sort of fish steak although I will not venture to try and identify it. Not an enormous portion but I was not particularly hungry.

Easter Island, part 3

Thu, 2:50pm. Just had a second beer and ordered a papaya juice and the bill before I push on to that mseum. It seems to be raining, or was - I'm under cover and it's hard to tell. Very thin looking shower and unless I missed it earlier it seems to have lasted about a minute. (I only noticed when I felt a little bit blowing onto me.) Nothing like the rain in Sao Paulo or Rio. (Was that really the last time I saw it rain? Can't be. I think there was a bit down in southern Chile, if nothing else. Oh, yes, of course, it pissed it down in Uyuni and Potosi, how could I have forgotten that?)

There is a horse in the street outside the restaurant. (Oh, it clearly is still raining, it's picking up again now. Hope it stops by the time I have finished this juice.) First one I've seen although there's no shortage of what I infer to be horse shit on the streets

Jesus wept. CLP15000 for the food (a tiny steak and a not excessive portion of chips), two small beers and two juices. That's not much short of twenty quid, and there will be a tip on top of that. At least I can dispose of my change with the tip.

There was a fairly nice if skinny little dog kicking around here, even if it did try to chew my wrist in a friendly way when I stroked it. I really want to wash my hands now though.

6:30pm. It's rained intermittently all afternoon. It's probably preferable to the heat of this morning but I'm a bit damp.

The museum is a couple of kilometres north of the centre. I found myself wandering round Ahu Kanga Kio'e and Ahu Tahai before I got there. That was quite cool I must admit, and it was hardly busy. Where are all these tourists who meant I struggled like mad to get a hotel booking?

I got to the museum at 4:50. It shuts at 5:30. I nearly didn't go in but since (hahahahaha) I may be on a tour tomorrow and it shuts at 12:30pm at weekends and isn't open on Mondays and I leave (admittedly late) on Tuesday, I figured I ought to give it a go. They started shutting the doors at 5:20, the cheeky fuckers. It was pretty interesting but mainly because I was reading the thick English translation of their displays. The exhibits were mildly interesting if a bit scarce, but it was basically the text that made it worthwhile. I got about halfway through before I chucked myself out. I may go back if I get the chance to finish it off.

Outside there is a sign showing a sort of trail which I evidently walked the first half of today in reverse. I may sort of walk the other half tomorrow, since I don't have a tour booked. Nearly everywhere seems to be a car and bike rental shop. I passed one place that might have been an option but there were two guys sat outside so I figured I'd give it a miss.

I walked past some other place later which looked a bit adventurous (boat tours with snorkelling, that kind of thing). They did list 'excursions' but as I was dithering the guy inside said 'hola!' to me, so I said it back to him and cleared off. I'm not going to be rushed.

Have come to some restaurant for food. Everywhere here looks shit, I've walked the length of the main street twice now counting this morning and afternoon, so I've just settled for the least pretentious looking place I could find.

I did at least spot an internet cafe earlier though I didn't go in as I had vague hopes of finding a tour company.

I guess I will just have to ask at the hotel. I hate taking recommended hotel tours but I keep doing it. At least it's easy.

Thu, 8pm. Just come to what the (probably American) waiter described to me as "the only proper bar" on the island. I would note the name but I can't see it anywhere inside. I think it's something like "Nandu". An amazing find after making a third pass up the main street. I only came in here as it looked the best of a bad lot. It's pretty dead but it is a bar of sorts and that's all I need. (It is insanely expensive, at CLP2000 for a 350ml can of Escudo, at the restaurant I ate at earlier it was only CLP1500. But sod it.)

(For the record, it is opposite Hotel Orongo.)

8:10pm. It is chucking it down outside. As I said, I got a bit damp earlier and still am, it was just about tolerable but pushing it. I think the fact that it rains like this and I don't have all the fancy weather gear really does put me off the idea of going round the island on a bike, even ignoring questions of fitness.

I shall write the guidebook's advice off in the same way I eventually did (after it hacked me off no end first) the same book's advice about it being desirable to go hiking in Torres del Paine national park. I'm sure it is, but don't lay it on too thick.

Thu, 9:30pm. Slightly worried about getting back to, and more importantly, into the hotel, but I shall heart from the apparent return of someone at 10:45pm last night. I won't aim to be back too late.

Apart from one other group by the door the place is empty. No big surprise but I find it amusing that when I got here the waiter asked me to move to a smaller table if I was on my own. (I failed to understand him, which is how we came to speak English and I was able to make my unverified guess he is American.) Clearly the hoped for rush hasn't occurred. :-)

9:40pm. Having a last one. I must say the waiter seems a man of few words. Every time I ask him for another drink (in English) he seems to stare at me a bit as if to say 'what?'. Seems a nice enough chap otherwise, not that I've spoken to him much.

This is a bit joyless but what the hell. I have vague plans to be up super-early (say 8am) tomorrow and see if I can arrange a tour for the same day. I somehow doubt my ability to pull it off (the getting up part, primarily), but what the hell. A man's reach should exceed his grasp, or what's a heaven for?

In some sense there is no rush, I have four more full days here, but I should try to get a move on I guess just in case (just in case what I don't know).

I suspect I will be refreshing myself with tap water tonight. I hope that's safe here.

I hope I can get into the hotel. But for fuck's sake, I think I'm paying well over a hundred dollars a night (I have some vague idea it's 140, but I don't know), it isn't cheap. For that money I think I might reasonably expect 24h access. (Mind you, the reception at the USD200/night Lakutaia wasn't open late at all, although if memory serves I had my room key card on me all the time and the outside door was probably never locked.)

No point really pushing it tonight though. Depending on how things go with the tour I may venture to one of the discos mentioned in my 5 year out of date guide book tomorrow, it being Friday, and they apparently don't get going until after midnight.

9:55pm. A guy is now playing a guitar behind me, and the waiter helped to move some tables to free up space for him. The sound system is still playing but I half wonder if he is going to perform. This is the sort of thing I can imagine tempting me to push it.

There's a guy fooling with some sort of drum too. (I am not looking round, but I can hear it.)

No, it is a band. They just turned the music off and they are playing a bit and they have a microphone. I may switch to the other side of my table if this goes on.

10:20pm. Did move round and they are playing. Quite good in a mellowish way. Just looked round (since I am no longer facing it) and the terrace is now moderately heaving. Seems a bit odd since the music is in here but there you go. I guess they just put the music on when it gets busy and people aren't here to listen as such.

Not too fussed about my 8am plan under these circumstances but the hotel situation nags. It's not like they said anything about closing hours on that welcome card they left out for me. I am imaging certain people I know would have a definite "fuck them" attitude (I may be wrong, but if I try to put those people in my shoes, that's how I think they'd react) but I don't know if I can emulate it.

11pm. The guys just finished playing and are packing up. I am going to have one more and leave. I believe that's the first live music I've seen so far on the trip, although no doubt I will remember something falsifying that after I post this. (I don't think the bar is closing anywhere near yet, but I have to draw the line somewhere.)

Somewhat oddly, to me, the bogs here have 50s-style American cartoon figures on with 'humorous' tequila slogans. (Men's "Have you hugged your toilet today?", women's "Helping women lower their standards for years?").

11:30pm. The sole advantage of the "toilet paper in the bin" system prevalent on the continent (and indeed 3500km off it) is that when you have a good shit you can admire It in the bowl afterwards without impediment. :-)

11:50pm. Having another in a beer-induced spirit of "fuck them at the hotel". Asked the waiter where he's from, he's Californian. Am glad, I had this nagging fear he was a local who just spoke good English and I'd thus been the annoying speaking-English-to-the-locals tourist all night. As it is you can omit the second adjective. Still not very chatty, I guess he's busy but I sense a slight dislike. Still, I am a tourist, which justifies any amount of odium, and he may regard himself as a local.

Am a bit concerned about the hotel but fuck it. At this rate I'm not doing the tour tomorrow so I suspect it will be a Saturday thing, in which case this will be my only unfettered weekend-ish night here. Well, there is Saturday night I suppose, but I have a vague hope I can get a tour which takes place over two days and covers different places each day, as a compromise since I can't see the island under my own steam. I suspect that won't be possible but I can hope. At least if I'm not rushing to book a tour at 9am tomorrow morning I have time to discuss it, assuming I feel more dynamic than I did today. I did pass a closed tour place with (doubtless unofficial) tourist information signs earlier which seemed to advertise two distinct tours.

Fri, 12:10am. It's vaguely tempting to stay for another but I almost can't be arsed. I've made my teenage-style stand against the hotel (this time without the aid of a mis-set clock) and I am a little tired and maybin general fuck it. I will ask the silent barman to call me a cab, if he thinks I won't get one on the street.

Just got the bill. It's correct, it contains a ten percent optional charge which takes it to 13200. I was going to call it 14000 but if they're putting a service charge on the bill fuck it. (My first beer I paid for in person, so I gave no tip. No doubt that's why blokely told me I could run a tab. I half suspected I could, but something in my UK-reared soul feels guilty at not proffering immediate payment. I don't do it to avoid paying a tip - I mentally planned to give one on departure - but I just feel that they are expecting me to pay and if I don't immediately do so it looks bad. Imagine being in a UK bar - even your local - and ordering a beer and swigging away without offering cash. If I was totally certain I was in a tab-running bar no problem, but somehow a lot of places fail to make that obvious. It's odd, in Tlaquepaque I never felt compelled to offer money immediately, but maybe I drank there too much and got used to it. I suspected it was the culture here even tonight bu
t I just didn't like to assume. I suppose the guy could have waved away my initial payment as he did my second one, which is probably what happened in eg Tlaquepaque.)

Odd. I gave them 15000 and just got 2000 change. I have left 300 change (from my pocket), the extra 100 is my tiny tocken recognition they weren't too arsey about their optional service charge.

12:25am. The bar isn't dead (though it's small) and the terrace is still full. Went out onto the street, gave it a minute with no cars and come back in to ask them to call me a taxi. Californian guy has spoken to someone, fingers crossed. The uncertainty annoys me but dogs and horses permitting I can walk home, the hotel is the big problem. It galls me to leave an obviously busy bar at this time but apart from the hotel shit I started drinking early and while I am far from pissed [at this point the taxi arrived], no, I am not pissed but I can see it from here, to say I am far from it would be wrong, but anyway, I do want to be up not ridiculously late tomorrow.

Californian guy advised me in a quite friendly way to wait for my taxi in the street as they don't hang around. CLP1500, which was OK.

Hotel lights were on but reception was shut. A guy (who was neither surly nor overly welcoming) was loitering around who told me my key was on the reception windowsill and gestured me round the side of the hotel to my room. All cool. I don't know if he was pissed off at (presumably) waiting up for me, but as I said earlier, fuck it, I assume he gets his share of the hundred plus dollars I am paying a night (remote islands clearly don't come cheap, though as on Isla Navarino I am sure I could get somewhere cheaper with more planning, and they may or may not be open 24h but at least you'd know why), and if he doesn't it's not my problem. Given the key was on the window sill I almost wonder if it was coincidence he was there, although I suspect not.

Anyway, it's now Fri, 12:35am. Given I am no way getting up at 8am I shall have a shower, then to bed. Not a bad night all things considered, even if not the best. I shall maybe consult reception tomorrow morning (afternoon?) to see what the official policy is, although in part I incline to a Grace Hopper-eque attitude that it's easier to get forgiveness than obtain permission, and maybe I shouldn't ask, because I may not like what I'm told.

Something to sleep on.

(Oh, I did note the name of the bar as the cab drove off, but beyond the fact that it began with M and was vaguely like "nandu", as noted earlier, I have totally lost it.)

Easter Island continued

Wed, 10:45pm. Someone just went into the room next door. I find that vaguely heartening, having been under the impression everyone at this hotel went to bed about sunset...

Had a shower, it was even hot. Feeling a bit bored, I really need to do one or two tiny chores (delete photos from memory cards, recharge some batteries) before I go to bed but I haven't forced myself yet. Do feel a bit better, I guess it's just been a slow and rather tedious day. With luck tomorrow will be more diverting. I have a nasty feeling I am going to sleep til 1pm or something, even with the 'free gift' of an extra two hours due to the time zone change. (I did get that mysterious aircraft sleepy feeling on the flight, but my seat was upright so I think every time I fell asleep and relaxed, my body collapsed forward and woke me up. So although I don't know I don't think I slept much oln the flight.)

There is that tropical insecty chirping noise going on in the background, just to add a bit of atmosphere to this catalogue of whinging.

Thu, midday. Sort of woke up at 9:30 but stayed in bed (half pleasantly, half I just didn't want to get up) til about 11 or 11:30. Disturbed by the cleaner about 10-ish, she went away and I was in fact chased out by a knock on the door at 12 just as I was about to leave.

Walking into town now. Will have to see about a tour in the next day or two. Had a look at my guide book in the hotel room this morning. The place is impossible, apparently. You should do a tour to see the main sights, then go off on your own. You can hire a jeep or a mountain bike. I can't drive and apparently "it's possible to do the main circuit in a day" (I assume this is for fit people) but "it's better to take 2-3 days" (so what, am I supposed to camp out?). So there's no way I'm going to see half the stuff I'm supposed to.

Not feeling as chipper as I'd hoped to be honest.

Oh, I did happen to pick up from the guide book that Papeete is Tahiti, I assume that's Spanish spelling. I didn't think Tahiti was Chilean, though to be honest I know little about it except its name (I have a vague idea it's independent, but am far from sure), yet the flight left from the national departures tent and I didn't see any obvious customs type screening. Maybe with the earthquake damage they are doing that sort of thing at the far end instead of in Santiago. I did read that international flights to/from Chile are having that kind of thing done in Arica and some other border cities, so that may be the explanation.

Thu, 2:15pm. Wandered around a touch morosely, found myself down by some extremely rocky 'beach' where (as is their unfailing custom) the Chilean Navy had set up a base to make me dubious about the safety of wandering round and taking photos. (I always have visions of the scene in O Lucky Man! where Mick is captured by the army in these situations.)

Saw my first moai on the way back, stood rather unattractively on the edge of some field containing horses. To be frank I wasn't overly stunned, although in my mood at the time it's maybe not too surprising.

After the walked up what is probably one of the main streets very slowly feeling very sweaty and hacked off. After numerous "no, that looks too wanky" I have come to a small restaurant for lunch. A frankly small and tough steak (I didn't expect anything brilliant here though, and it willl hopefully set me up to appreciate the meat in Argentina) and chips and a beer later, I am feeling a bit better. The impossibility of seeing the island properly still bugs me, but the J K Jerome effect has kicked in slightly, and I think the beer may have helped.

There are loads of (apparently shut) tour offices on this street. I think I will have another beer and continue to wander northwards, there is a museum up there somewhere which probably ought to be visited and if I see a tour company which looks open I may go in, feeling at last sufficiently fortified to enter into a dialogue with such like.

Oh, my camera seems to be playing up. I think it's partly that the damn rechargeables never have any power and I have coaxed it back into life by switching batteries with my GPS (although it still took a few minutes to start working, which suggests some more fundamental problem than simply low batteries).

Still, things seem a bit better than they did.

Easter Island

10pm local time. Well I just got to the hotel.

Had a certain "what the fuck am I doing here" feeling while waiting to collect my bag at the airport.

It took me a while to get a taxi, a couple of people offered (although I mostly stood around feeling disoriented and left to my own devices) but the first was some old woman in the passenger seat of a car driven by someone else which made me a bit edgy, so I ignored the next guy and waited for it to quiet down. Got a taxi in the end, CLP1500 although I gave the guy 2000. It was about a two minute drive, tops, maybe a minute, seriously. Checked in OK and bought a bottle of water for CLP1000. Hotel seems fairly nice and the room is large, but it's dead. Greeting card on the bed says it's a 20 minute walk into town or they can call you a taxi. I doubt that applies at this time of night and to be honest I doubt there is 24h reception, although we shall see. This is all a little bit too much like Hotel Lakutaia on Isla Navarino for my tastes. I think six nights of this may kill me. Still, at least there *are* taxis, which has to be a good sign.

The receptionist did seem to say something about a transfer, although it was far from clear. I refuse to believe the old woman was it, and I didn't see any other evidence of anyone waiting to pick me up. I didn't expect it anyway, although if I did miss it it's a bit annoying.

The road from the airport seemed relatively unlit, I have no idea what the walk into the town might be like.

Anyway, I am here and I suppose I will have a shower and go to bed and see what it's really like tomorrow. I will hopefully feel a bit more positive then.

First impressions of the island are minimal. The air had a slightly humid quality and a strange but not unpleasant smell which I noticed as I got off the plane, although that (apart from the humidity, assuming it's not just that I need a shower) may have been something about the airport as I have ceased to notice the smell. I haven't seen a great deal yet of course. There are palm trees but then again they have those in Santiago, so that's not particularly amazing.

So yeah, I'm on Easter Island. Whoopy-do.

On the plane

7:10pm (in Santiago). We took off maybe a bit late but not by much, I think we officially were due to leave at 5:35pm.

Biggest plane I've been on for a while, I think it's a 767-300 but I could be misremembering. 2-3-2 seating arrangement. We actually have personal screens in the seat backs, which is better than the transatlantic flights. I can't be arsed with watching a film though and am just listening to my MP3 player.

I am in an aisle seat in the middle block. At least it isn't the middle. The guy on my left is getting on my wick, he is visibly 'dancing' in his seat, probably trying to entertain his mate. I have this subtle but distinct dislike for the pair of them. Before we took off dancing bloke wanted to go to the bog, and of course he decided to come out on my side instead of asking his mate to move. He was perfectly polite and so on but I don't care, I've decided I don't like him/them.

Oh, the flight is apparently to some place called something like Papeete (probably not spelled correctly) with a stopover in Easter Island. I have no idea where this Papeete place is.

10pm (in Santiago). Still on the plane, the map on the entertainment system says we have an hour left to go. Feeling very dull. Not looking forward to arriving very much, I have visions of difficulty getting to my hotel and I also have some idea it's just a tiny bit out in the sticks, although I really don't know. I was lucky to get a hotel at all (which scarcely squares with them considering this low season, but still). So I suspect it will be a case of having to go to bed as soon as I arrive as I won't be able to do anything else. (Another night it may be different, I will have had a chance to take a GPS reading of somewhere in town and had a look at the road and assessed the possibilities for getting a taxi back. But I expect it to be dark when we arrive.)

I don't think it's quite such a desolate place as Isla Navarino, although who knows, so I vaguely hope there will be such conveniences as taxis.

Maybe it's just all the hanging around at the airport and sitting on the plane which is making me feel a bit listless and uninspired. I guess I may feel differently in the morning.

Oh, as a completely unimportant remark, the 'whole world' view which periodically comes up on the map channel on the entertainment system labels exactly two cities on the planet, Washington and Brasilia. The closer views do indeed label Santiago and Easter Island as might be expected.

I wonder if I can get a GRPS signal on the island or if I will be writing the mother of all blog posts over the next six days to be sent on my return. I think I should be able to though. I suppose I can always write something from an (apparently) expensive internet cafe. I have to go to one to book a hotel in Santiago for when I get back on Tuesday, having been too slack to do it before, and I also really need to book up hotels, flights and what have you for the first week or two in Argentina. I should have done it while I was in Santiago but there you go.

10:40pm (Santiago). Papeete just appeared on the edge of the map. Evidently it's some small island. I almost wish I was going there instead, it's obviously more remote. I feel I settled for second best.

10:45pm (Santiago). I suspect the island is visible in the twilight off the right hand side, because at least two idiots have tried to take flash photos of something...

Five minutes ago they said they were going to show a video about taking care of the island during your visit. Nothing yet, I am hoping we won't have to watch it now but I guess there's still time to squeeze it in.

Queuing

Stood in some non-moving queue, having checked five minutes ago and seen that gate 2 is now marked for my flight. Reassuringly I can see the boarding card of the woman ahead of me in the queue and she's going to Easter Island too. I am in no great rush to board (I mean, I have an allocated seat, although I have no idea if it's aisle or window, no one asked me, I just hope I'm not in the middle...) and would rather be sat down but I figured I ought to queue in case there is no announcement. All the announcements seem to be about some damn flight to Antofagasta, which they just will not shut up about.

Couldn't handle the suspense any more

Have come through security. (I have an insane amount of change on me.)I think I've got ages, none of the three 'gates' seem to show my flight (they have the destinations written on whiteboards). I just hope there will be an announcement.

Sigh

Since of course THERE ARE NO CLOCKS AT ALL, as per standard airport design practice, I was getting a bit jittery about missing the flight. There are very few announcements.

Was relatively cool in the tent where I was waiting. Come over to the correct tent to pass through security and you can see it's rather warmer once past there. Decided not to submit to that any longer than necessary and am waiting in the 'land' side of the same tent, but it's rather warm here too. I am not going back over to the first tent, I will stay 'land side' for now since at least I won't be trapped then if I do want to wander elsewhere.

There are fans but they aren't great. Or rather, they are great when they catch you, which seems to be about one second every minute. The centre part of this tent seems better, I think the outer parts are thinner and too much heat and light is penetrating. (I have had to turn the brightness on my phone display up to full, despite being 'inside', and it's still slightly hard to read.)

Plane noise

I spoke too soon earlier. There seems to be an enormous burst of noise every minute or so now...

Random observation

How obvious is it I am bored?

Not for the first time, I wonder why airline tickets and boarding passes have to be such an awkward size. Why can't they be passport-sized instead? Wouldn't that be logical? As it is the damn things never fit properly in your pocket. Even if you're wearing a proper jacket, they still produce awkwardly and get crumpled and risk being knocked out or stolen.

I have folded mine to fit it in my pocket. I just hope they don't reject it as a result.

Still at the airport

Very noisy plane just going overhead. Make me realise just how few planes I actually seem to be hearing take off or land.

Very bored and slightly too hot.

Had an overpriced and undersized ham & cheese sandwich, an ice lolly and now on a can of diet coke. I have no idea where the toilet is and I have a nasty feeling it will be a pay toilet too.

At the airport

Managed to get checked in, boarding isn't for another 3h so I am sat at some makeshift cafe (it's vaguely festival-ish with all these marquees) in what was presumably a car park before the earthquake. No waitress has come near me but right now I'm in no hurry, I am looking on it as free use of their table.

Hmm, one just came over. Have ordered 'a cold beer', I didn't expect that to complete my order, I was going to get a diet coke as well, but she ran off before I got the chance to say anything else.

On the metro

Withdrew another CLP100,000. It's only another two or three quid in withdrawal fees and a shit exchange rate into Argentinian pesos later on.

Am sick of people on the metro who expect you to move out of their way WHILE IT'S MOVING. I will let go of my handhold and move out of your way once it has stopped, fuckface. You don't need to save two seconds time by moving closer to the door right now.

Waffle

Midday. Checked out OK, have come to some little cafe right next to the flat to have something to eat on the grounds it will be expensive at the airport and maybe difficult tonight.

Vague plan is to try to get on the metro and go over to the airport afterwards. I am a bit apprehensive about buses not running as normal or not being able to find the departure area or just 'stuff' but I suspect it will all be fine and I suppose the main thing is to allow as much time as possible.

Just got up

Didn't want to. Sigh. Have packed and need to have a last check round as per usual. Don't know whether to withdraw lots of cash now or not. I already have loads and I don't want to be stuck with too much Chilean currency as this is my last week in the country, on the other hand I also don't want to be stuck on the island unable to do anything as I have no cash and no way to obtain any. Sigh again.

To bed indeed

OK, I was stupid and just drunk enough to stay up and finish my last 3l bottle of coke zero while admiring the view for the last time. Also found the drunken energy to reply badly to an e-mail from Rab, sorry about that Rab.

One last song and one last swig of diet coke and then I have to get to bed. At least the cleaner should wake me up tomorrow in time for the flight, even if (as I hope won't happen) it's so late I have to pay for another day's accommodation here.

Random observations

7:50pm. I note, as I did when here at night, there are quite a few guys with barbecues set up on top of shopping trolleys.

Starting to get dark, only just but it is noticeable. I think I might get something to eat after this - I was toying with KFC (or, actually, Kentucky Fried Chicken, as the shop is labelled), but I think I won't - and see if that can, J K Jerome-style, offer me some sense of wellbeing, then wander over to that bar in the street next to Bar Liguria. Seems vaguely fitting I should go there my last night here as I did my first. Mustn't get too drunk, of course.

I note signs on the entrance to some metro stations saying not to enter with bags. No one said anything when I did it on my arrival and departure here last time but now I've seen that I am a bit concerned about doing it tomorrow.

9:20pm. Walked over to El Candil, next to Bar Liguria. Encountered a friendly and probably genuinely nice drunk chap on the way on the scrounge for a fag (I was warmed to him by the fact he admitted he was drunk, something I am prone to myself) but all the same glad I lost him as he stopped to scrounge off other passers by. Have ordered some sort of spicy beef sandwich after ascertaining it lacked mayonnaise, along with an extremely small bottle of Coke Light, prior to switching back to beer.

I think the walk over has lifted my mood slightly although I am still a touch down. We shall see if the food helps.

9:50pm. Although a touch small, the sandwich was very nice and was actually spicy. Don't feel on top of the world but I think it helped. Have ordered a beer, I think it must be expensive here. It's clearly slightly classy and they do neither draught nor large bottles of beer. Drinking 330ml of Austral which I suspect will cost me as much as a litre in a cheaper place. Ah well.

10:25pm. Figured I might as well move straight over to Bar Liguria. Maybe because it's earlier than I've been here before it's surprisingly busy. Vaguely annoyed my 'usual' table just inside the door is occupied, am sat at the bar as there are no tables free. (Actually I think the place is huge, there are three doors on the street all of which seem to lead to semi-distinct areas. But I am in the bit I've been in before.)

I am astounded to note I have almost exactly three months of the trip left. It feels like I'm well over halfway somehow. Probably because I had this big nine week stretch on the main booking with no flights, and everywhere else is only a few weeks (well, six in Mexico).

I asked how much the drink was, the guy seemed a bit surprised, maybe it's usual to run a tab but since I was sat at the bar I wasn't sure. He said 1800, I have him 2000 and have not received any change. No big deal but I find that a touch off.

The music here, while broadly acceptable, is pseudo-50s rock. It fits perfectly with the decor (which, to my Hollywood-nurtured mind) looks like a 50s American diner, but is a change from the 2000-era London pub music I experienced my last two visits.

11:10pm. Just ordered a second probably-half litre. The barman has given me, over the last minute or two, two receipts (presumably one for each beer) and CLP200 in change. I'll leave it on the bar, it's a little insulting in a strange way to have that taken from one beer but not the other but I will assume it's a sort of accident or custom, and to be honest the guy is semi-welcome to a 10% tip. He keeps giving me peanuts (in the shell), although of course everyone else gets them too, which I can regard as worth 25p a shot.

"Johnny B Goode" playing now. It's cool but I kind of preferred the 2000 London pub music. What the hell. At least this is consistent and if I stick it out it may transition later on.

11:25pm. Just checked I have the printouts for the flights and hotel in my pocket. It's a 3751km flight. I noticed earlier in my guide book that back in the early 20th century there was a regular (mail?) flight from Santiago to Arica, around 2000km, which took a day and a half. It's one thing to realise what air travel means, another to think even in the early days of aviation my 5h flight tomorrow would have taken 2-3 days, even if they didn't require (presumably nonexistent) refuelling facilities. I wonder when the first flight to Easter Island happened. I suspect I will discover that fact without effort in some museum on the island, if not it's something to look up next time I remember.

From the guide book, apparently it was exactly a hundred years ago (I remember as it was their centary, and it's the bicentary this year) the first plane flew from Chilean soil, covering the massive distance of 50m. But then aviation was young I suppose, I can't remember when the Wright brothers flew but I suspect it was 190something.

They are playing "Love Me Do" now. Maybe the music is slowly advancing in time. :-)

11:40pm. Big swathe of Beatles songs. I am wondering what group would characterise the 70s if they really are advancing through time. :-)

I am not drunk yet but I find it both fascinating and scary my Dad (a big Beatles fan) was half my age when this music was new. I can believe people will still be listening to the Beatles in 25 or 50 years time thinking about it like that.

In a similar vein of thought, I look around the bar and (although I'm sure people's clothes were different) only the computerised till with LCD screen provides concrete evidence it isn't still 1967. If only we had a time machine, it would be freakily cool if we could have anti-retro bars where people in 2010-era gear and with 2010-sensibilities could listen to 2050-era music. :-)

Man, I am rambling, but I really am not drunk. Was thinking - can't remember why, oh yes, it was those Tom Lehrer songs - that we have made progress in the last 50 years. Back then we worried about nuclear war making the planet a lifeless globe. It seems to me that global warming is an improvement, we face species extinction (probably not even that, if I wasn't going to be dead of old age or drowned, I'd put money on no more than pseudo-Western cultural extinction, there will be some obscure tribal people somewhere living somewhere whatever, I reckon) but non-human life will go on all the same. Progress baby. :-)

12:05am. Just ordered another. That would escape comment even in this cavalcade of trivialities except that I got two receipts for the thing over the course of two minutes. Maybe I can have a blood alcohol test on leaving and reclaim the price of a pint if this carries on. :-) I got change this time but am leaving it on the bar per my plan to tip (the previous change has disappeared), I got more peanuts so what the hell.

I no longer recognise the music but it is clearly modernish. I am aware of my own antiquity but I feel I have enough sense to not call anything 80s or 90s modern. I think it's actually Spanish language, insofar as I can tell, as I keep hearing "sexo, sexo". The song is very slightly familiar but I can't place it.

For all the fact I am not having a fantastic time right now - though it's OK - I am slightly stupidly proud of not feeling totally out of place. I seem to fluctuate between being able to communicate fluently and having troubles, and they occur independently of drinking, but even in the latter circumstances I usually get there in the end, even if it's annoying and embarassing. I can't imagine feeling this comfortable in Brazil, although doubtless someone more confident with no more Portuguese than me would be fine. (If I didn't observe it at the time, this reminds me that my Brazillian Portuguese phrasebook includes some phrases related to sex and relationships. I find that half annoying and half ridiculous. Even if you're Mr Smooth, the idea of someone consulting the phrasebook during sex to look up a phrase like (I make this up, but there are things like this) "do that again" or "don't touch me there" is inherently laughable. (And as for the pseudo-chat up lines, fuck off.) Maybe yo
u're supposed to memorise them up front. But I assume if you're so personable as to be at that stage with a native speaker while needing a phrasebook you won't need them on the job, body language and gestures will carry you through. I suspect the authors put them in as a kind of joke. It reminds me of that xkcd cartoon where the guy is looking up "foreplay" on wikipedia while in bed.)

(Oh, the phrasebook also includes such phrases as "you're just using me for sex". Because I'm sure if you get to that stage, the conversation is going to be intelligible with the help of a phrase book. I struggled to order a fucking beer with the aid of the phrase book! I can only assume it's there so it can be thrown out as a hopefully intelligible insult as a sop to one's pride in the middle of some mutually incomprehensible break-up scene, if it's not just part of the joke on the part of the authors.)

(The more I think about that last the more ridiculous it seems. You are a woman - presumably, given that I can't imagine a man saying "you are just using me for sex", though either way it makes little difference - so unable to communicate with the locals you need to use a phrase book. By the means of body language and a few helpful (ha!) phrases you connect and make the beast with two backs, perhaps more than once. Your conversation is limited to what the phrase book gives you. He presumably speaks no English, otherwise you don't need the phrase book, so you completely fail to discover you share an interest in seventeenth century madrigals and the theory and practice of Leninism. Some time afterwards the passion fades and you are inclined to dredge this phrase out of the book. WHAT DID YOU THINK THE 'RELATIONSHIP' WAS ABOUT IF NOT SEX? Yet the phrasebook does not include a translation of that from the smug yet justified local. Anyone who doesn't speak a mutual language with their sex
ual partner has no right to say "you are just using me for sex" with a straight face.)

I may be feeling a little lonely and jealous of these theoretical people, but I standy by those sentiments. I am moderately proud of the latter bits, I feel they could form the basis of a half-decent standup routine if only I had the skill. :-)

1:10am. Just ordered another beer and the music is up to Queen's "I want to break free". My 'travel through musical time' theory is not as totally ridiculous as I thought.

1:40am. Just ordered another and last beer. "Our House" by Madness on. I can't place a lot of what they've played but it is modernish. The 50s rock theme is well deserted at least.

Man, I hope I can be up in time. The flight isn't til 5pmish and even with transit (and allowing for 'am I allowed on the metro with bags' worries) there's loads of time. But I can't remember when I have to check out, I need to dredge the laptop out when I get home to check. I think it's midday which is fairly cool and gives me frankly too much time to get to the airport, but given how late I've been up lately I have a slight nervousness. I nearly always get up when I have to though, and what the hell. It would be galling to miss my flight to Easter Island after coming through the earthquake with it still allowed. But if the last few days are any template, the cleaner will drag me blearly eyed out of bed in plenty of time anyway.

2:15am. Just got a cab home. Left the bar literally five minutes ago, I had half a pint left but was feeling a bit drunk, were I not leaving tomorrow I would have stayed but as it was they played "There is a light that never goes out" and the next song sucked and I figured I'd leave. Cab driver didn't know my obscure street but I said it was between Baquedano and Universidad Catlolica and he was cool about it, said it would be 1500 and I gave him 2000 as he was willing to search for the street, though it wasn't necessary really. (The flat is a minute or two's walk from Baquendao, although if you emerge from the station it's tricky to locate, which is why I didn't just ask him to take me to Baquedano.)

2:20am. Back at the flat. Not hungry but sort of wish I had some takeaway food. What the hell. Will check checkout time and then to bed. And tomorrow I have to be up earlyish, never mind all my protestations on previous days.

Can hardly believe I am going to Easter Island tomorrow. I hope I really am and don't miss the flight or something!