Hola, buenos dias.......

Here we are in Easter Island, and I (Linda) am trying to remember the few words I learned 20 years ago in Madrid - needless to say there´s not much Spanish going on!

We arrived here around 10am after a night flight, hence hardly any sleep! But..... what a difference! There was an info desk, and several people from different hotels/hostels etc all waiting to help us out, including a lovely guy from the hostel that we´d already hoped we could stay in. We were whisked away immediately in a taxi and arrived only a couple of minutes later at our new home. It´s a Youth Hostelling Interntional place, and is really clean, comfortable and homely (yes, we have a loo seat and even hot water twice a day!). The resident puppy (Titano) is really cute and there is a real extended family feel (and lots of extended family that live around the premises).

It took us a while to catch up on sleep, and then we explored the town. It´s only really one main street but is so laid back and relaxed that time just seems to disappear by itself. We went on a guided tour yesterday around the island to see the Moais (the stone statues that make Easter Island famous) and heard about their history, clan interaction and warfare, the arrival of missionaries etc. We took soooo many photos, but then how often do people get to come to Easter Island, assuming they even know where it is!?

Our hosts were having a big BBQ for their family and some friends last night and asked us if we´d like to join them. For 5 quid we got to scoff as much meat, salad and wine as we could manage - it was lovely. Although we had limited conversations due to language barriers we still managed to laugh and smile a lot - the people here are really lovely and welcoming. We were even treated to an impromptu local dance which was very special.

We´ve also had some great chats with fellow travellers - including a couple with 2 yound kids who gave up the rat race of London 4 years ago and have been sailing around the world ever since (they didn´t even know how to sail a year and a half before they left!!). They´re curently about half way around the world and have no immediate plans to go home..... it´s the floating "Good Life" as they have to bottle all their own food, wash their clothes by hand (using sea water) and have to take 3 hour shifts during the night at the helm, as well as home schooling, doing repairs etc etc. Because Easter Island is so small and the pace is so slow it really does lend itself to long chats, comparing notes and swapping stories....fantastic.

Today we had a much needed lie in, caught up on e.mail stuff and as you can see have now spent hours updating blogger and flickr. We hope you appreciate it! Thanks for all your comments - keep them coming....it´s lovely to hear news from home and to know that you´re following our travels (even when we seem to drop off the planet for a while!).

We´re off to a special local meal and show tomorrow evening which should be good. We then leave on Saturday for Santiago. Apparently it´s much warmer here (and here we are in fleeces and jeans compared to Tahiti) so it´s going to be a real shock in Chile. However, we´re told it´s also about 3 times more expensive here than it is on the mainland, and given that Easter Island is a third of the price of Tahiti we´re looking forward to spending a lot less money for the rest of our time travelling :-)

Well, hopefully that´s brought things up to speed, and given you a flavour of life over the last couple of weeks. We should be able to update things much more regularly over our remaining weeks, but only time will tell.

Our love as always, from across the miles,

Penny & Linda xxx