Two million METRES APART

One of the most remote and mysterious outposts on the planet, Easter Island is an enigmatic place to practise extreme social distancing. We discover more than moai in the far, far Pacific

- SHAFIK MEGHJI

After a steep hike up the Te Ara O Te Ao trail, through eucalyptus, papaya, cypress, and acacia trees, and across swaying grasslands dotted with purple flowering thistles, I finally reached the vast crater rim of Rano Kau, a 324m-high volcano that dominates the southernmost tip of Easter Island. The calls of a swooping, hawk-like caracara briefly sounded before being drowned out by a howling wind that threatened to buffet me over the precipice and into the flooded caldera below.

Now dormant, Rano Kau is home to the ruins of a ceremonial village named Orongo, which is closely associated with the fabled Birdman contest. To the north, it offers views of the island’s only town, quiet, low-rise Hanga Roa – with the aid of my camera zoom, I even made out a pair of moai statues on a distant headland. In the opposite direction, the navy-blue waters of the Pacific were perfectly framed by a shallow, semi-circular gap in the crater wall.

Although it’s one of Easter Island’s most dramatic sites, Rano Kau is rarely crowded. There was no one else at the crater or on the narrow path to Orongo. Indeed, when I gazed out at the seemingly endless ocean the thought struck me that, beyond the island’s shoreline, there was no one within 2,000km.

The navel of the world