Welcome to the first April edition of the #ListifyLife Spring Challenge! This week we have Little Things that Make Me Happy (as a side note, I am completely blanking on whether Me should be capitalized in a title or not…)
Blue Skies! So, so important! I am one of those folks whose moods are affected by the weather. I really do not like gray skies. Just a little bit of blue peeking through the clouds can carry me through two days of crappy weather. Blue Skies is a really little thing that goes a long way toward making me happy.
Hiking with my Husband. I guess “walking” is a more accurate description. I don’t get to walk/hike with my husband as often I would like, because we have to work around his work schedule and his golfing. 😉 But whenever we both have a weekend morning free, we get Allie McBeagle and head off to the nearest provincial park. I walk every day with Allie, but she gets to go off-lease when Steve is around. Now, she’s starting to go pretty deaf, so we have to make sure we keep an eye on her. I think my husband really enjoys these walks, as well. He warns me that when the dog goes to the Rainbow Bridge we will lose our incentive to walk. And he’s right, a dog forces you to get outdoors. But I love the walks and hikes and would participate regardless.
I especially love when my husband goes and fetches me a Surprise Latte before one of our walks! I can only have caffeine before, oh, 10:30 a.m. is probably safest. Maybe 11 a.m. if I want to push it. We often have coffee on our walks, but a surprise latte makes me very happy.
A Beagle Sleeping on My Lap. Sometimes it’s a PITN when Allie is demanding to rest with “Yap” (beagle-speak for Lap, one of her nicknames for me) and “Yap” really needs to break her brain with spreadsheets or kill her back washing floors or something. But you know what? A beagle forcing Yap to take a break is not a bad thing at all. When my dog is resting with me (on me) and snoring/snuffling away, she’s content so I’m content. One of the simple joys of life. Loving a dog.
Hugging my Kids! Anyone with kids, this pretty much goes without saying, but I only get to see Eldest Son in July and August, when he’s visiting from teaching high school overseas, so that First Hug is oh-so-wonderful! And each summer hug is so important because it needs to carry me throughout another year. And then there’s Youngest Son! He gives the greatest hugs. He only lives 90 minutes away, not a 10-hour plane ride away, but he’s over six feet, which is a lot taller than Moi, and I like to stand on this step in our mud room when I hug him. Whenever I hug him, I think of the tiny little 4 lb. 15 oz. preemie born 25 years ago. But now my preemie can squeeze and hug and lift me. I also have to get on the step to hug my DILly, so is also nearly six feet tall.
Last I left off, we were hopping in our rental vehicle and driving to Rano Raraku Quarry. We had eaten breakfast in town before leaving to enjoy the views, and we’d purchased fresh pineapple and watermelon and grapes and cheese and water and sliced meat and doughy crusty things. So we kind of had a picnic lunch that we nibbled on as we drove and explored. We called it the Two Squares a Day Plus Pisco Sours for All and Wine for the Winos/Water for Cindy Meal Plan. Because, apparently, I “had” to eat several times a day or I would “crash.” But, let me say, I drink a lot of milk back home and, honestly, I just had to make up those missing calories. Not being a wino myself, I had to ingest, you know, actual food.
At any rate, it was amazing to catch sight of the quarry out the car window:
As you approach the parking lot, you realize that those dots on the hillside are Moai! If you are on a tour bus, I don’t know, no matter how nice the guide is, how knowledgeable he or she is, they are likely to be explaining where you are heading as you are going there. There is something to be said for simply discovering where you are going as you arrive. Especially if, like our foursome, you don’t educate yourself a whole lot in advance. It’s like you’re just driving along and suddenly see this spectacular sight. It’s an adventure!Some of these statues have bodies that extend way, way into the ground. There is some argument whether all the Moai were intended to be moved from the quarry. Were some intended to remain where they were carved? There is a spot you can see a monster head lying horizontal half-carved from rock. Pictures don’t do the quarry justice. I like this one because I was able to “nip” off folks walking along the path so one might think I was there all alone, like a NatGeo photographer or something. One might fantasize about such things if one is delusional or starving from lack of nutrition/Canadian milk.It’s too bad this head isn’t facing the other way around. Then the people GETTING IN MY PICTURE could seem to be marching into the Moai’s mouth. Seriously, I like the little troupe walking into the back of his neck.
There is so much to see at the Quarry! We hiked up to a crater lake, and across the lake we could see more Moai. They are just everywhere.
After enjoying a light lunch (our snacks) near the quarry parking lot, we headed to see more Moai, the iconic rows of statues I remembered from my parents’ pictures. We could spy them way, way far away. So we drove to them.
We are worshiping the sun, or being the Moai, or something that no longer makes sense.Closeup of the two Moai on the very right, to show an example of one wearing the hat. There is also a batch of inland Moai. We bought some lovely fresh pineapple from a lady nearby.
We also explored some cave paintings and petroglyphs. There is so much to see on Easter Island!
The next day wasn’t sunny. We visited Orongo, the ancient village. It was pretty cool but we didn’t stay there long. I do believe it had started raining. We walked around and had a look, though.
The people would climb in through those little openings to sleep.Close-up of an entrance.One of several fallen/pushed over Moai we encountered during our explorations. I am pretty much sitting as close to the statue as I can without touching it (a no-no). Just to give an idea of the size of these things.
Another thing we did our second day with the vehicle was visit one of the Festival events, a horse race. I’ll cover that next post, plus we had quite an adventure exploring the Windows to the Sea, which were another surprise…
Going back to my last post about our Chilean travels, we arrived late on January 30th and settled into our cabanas, went out for a quick bite, and hung around the Tapati Festival grounds for awhile.
January 31st, our first full day on the island, was spent at the beach in town, where I got a really bad sunburn everywhere I didn’t apply sunscreen. Luckily, SILly had a long-sleeved button-up shirt to lend me as a cover-up because I only packed sleeveless cover-ups (bad idea; take a long-sleeved light blouse to avoid sunburns). I also got caught up in a riptide with DH and SILly, but they are both strong swimmers and saved me. To avoid getting slammed into the rocks in the area we were caught in, “I” (as in they partially dragged me) “swam” toward the marina and used the ropes from the boats that were out on the ocean (so no boats docked) to drag myself back to shore. Well, it was an adventure.
What the marina looks like when the boats are in and waves aren’t trying to bash me against rocks. See the ropes? When SILly and DH saved me, we made our way from a bay to the left to this bay with ropes-without-boats and, hand-over-hand, thusly and thisly and frustly and fristly we dragged ourselves to safety.We had wonderful weather for our first full day. Down at the nearest beach, after I’d avoided drowning, we walked around and saw several Moai and this lovely little swimming area where children would not be swept to sea.These Moai are walkable from town (as in you can walk to them from the beach area, not that they walked TO the beach, although legend says they might have). The Moai were carved in the Quarry (which we would visit the following day) and somehow transported to near the ocean. There is a lot of information about the Moai on the Interwebs. I’m just gonna show pictures to entice you to visit.An example of what the Moai might have looked like before the folks of Easter Island began warring with neighboring tribes, which entailed trying to smash as many of other tribes’ Moai as possible, or at least knock them down.On the morning of February 1st, we rented this cute little Crossover from Jorge for two days. We didn’t go on tours. We’d done the tour thing in wine country. We took our little map, and BILly, being a “professional driver,” took his spot behind the wheel, SILly was the “tour guide,” and DH and I got to boss everyone around or just sit back and soak it all up, depending who was “in charge” that day.Honestly, we had very little clue what we were doing. We hopped in the vehicle and drove to the first site we could pinpoint on the map (it was a knocked down Moai). But before we arrived at the first of a multitude of sites around the island (which are best explored by renting a vehicle, IMO, even if you don’t know what you’re doing or where you’re going), we had to stop and simply drink in the freaking BEAUTY of the island. It was breathtaking. DH, here, is orchestrating the waves.Aside from the reconstructed Moai guy shown in a photo up top, this red chunk of rock was the first of a lot of “topknots” (representing a hairstyle) that we saw knocked off around the island.
Your mission, should you choose to accept it, when visiting Rapa Nui, is whether or not to go on a guided tour. I’m pretty sure Jorge had suggestions for tour guides. It’s not like you have to book the guides in advance. You CAN book a guide in advance or just wait until you’re there. I read advice on Trip Adviser to take a tour first and THEN rent a vehicle. But what’s the fun in that? If you take a tour first, yes, you get to learn a lot more than we did. If you simply rent a vehicle and head out, though, there’s more of a sense of adventure. So take from that what you will. There’s really no wrong choice; there is just what is best for you as a traveler. The island isn’t large. In two days, we felt were able to see a ton of sites simply having a rental vehicle and then walking into town at night for dinner after a hard-earned siesta. It’s an awesome way to explore Easter Island!
More piccies next time! Because we visited the Quarry on February 1st, and because we were not on a tour, coming upon it was a bit of a surprise. Topped with lotsa Awesome Sauce.
Do you like to rent a vehicle when you travel, or go on tours, or a combination?
It’s Week 2 of the #ListifyLife Spring Challenge! I am posting every Tuesday.
The topic this week? The Books I’d Want to Live in for Awhile… My picks, in no particular order but with some degree of rationalization, are:
When I thought about this topic, I decided to go with the books that most enthralled or otherwise inspired me as a child. The ones I identified with. I didn’t read Gone with the Wind until I was 21 or so, but I chose it as my most “adult” book, because I’d love to stand near Scarlett O’Hara and whack her on the head every once in a while. But I’m getting ahead of my nominations…
My list is missing Raggedy Ann and Andy and the Nice Fat Policeman. I (well, my older sister but I stole them) had 5 or 6 in the Raggedy Ann and Andy series, but the one starring the Nice Fat Policeman really piqued my interest. Who doesn’t want to live the life of a rag doll? I had my own Raggedy Ann and Andy, and I remember declaring to my dad that I would name a kid Andy, which turned out to be his middle name (Andrew). Years later, I actually DID name my first son Andrew, after my dh’s brother, Andy, who passed away at 25 from an asthma attack. But we didn’t actually call our son Andy, because that was Andy’s name. His legal name is Andrew, though.
Hmm, why isn’t Raggedy Ann and Andy and the Nice Fat Policeman on my list then? Quite simply, I ran out of space in the cute graphic box. This is the book I also read to my grade one class, so it stuck in my memory.
Back to my nominations:
Anne of Green Gables by Lucy Maud Montgomery. This one is simple. I’m Canadian, and so is Anne. Anne is a little quirky and odd and has great friends and great adventures. Plus, I’ve never visited Prince Edward Island. Living in Anne of Green Gables for awhile would give me that chance.
Winnie the Pooh by A.A. Milne. Hmm, I seem to have a penchant for stuffed animal stories, but, honestly, stuffed animals come to life? I’m there! Not scary like Chucky. Being a Wednesday’s Child, I always identified with Eeyore, although others might classify me more like a Tigger. But really I want to steal Winnie the Pooh’s honey while he’s stuck in that hole.
On the Banks of Plum Creek by Laura Ingalls Wilder. I could have chosen any of the LIW books for this “living in awhile” list, but I didn’t really want to be caught in a long, cold winter and On the Banks of Plum Creek left a lasting impression on me as an 8-year-old finally realizing actual people actually wrote actual books. That writing books was actually something an actual person might actually get to do some day. This blew me away! I learned to read peeking over my older sister’s shoulder when she was in grade 1 (we didn’t have kindergarten or more than 2 TV channels, and the family lore goes that perhaps I was bored – or a genius; the jury is still out). I was 4, maybe closer to 5 because it would have been in the fall. I learned to read via Dr. Seuss and likely my sister’s grade 1 readers, but our grade 3 teacher read us the LIW books every day. Laura had dark hair and always had to wear pink, like me (honestly, my mother!!) whereas Laura’s sister had blond hair and got to wear blue (like my sister – Mom!!!). Laura had an adventurous life, and she got to live in a sod sorta house in this book. This greatly appealed to my imagination, because until the age of 5 I grew up in a tiny farming community where 95% of the residents were related to each other (but not intermarried – we had scruples), and my grandparents were pioneers. Laura’s dad was a pioneer. One + one = Budding Writer whose first attempt at a novel was a grade three project, a little paper pamphlet book I called “On the Shores of Mable Lake.”
The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis. I doubt this one needs an explanation. I mean, come on, a wardrobe with a magical passage to another world where you get to ride a huge lion? The wardrobe itself is reason enough. I spent an inordinate amount of time as a child trying to figure out what a furniture “wardrobe” was.
Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell. I had some hesitation choosing GWTW because although it’s one of my favorite character reads, it’s set during the U.S. Civil War, which feels like an odd era to want to “live in for awhile.” As a Canadian growing up in a not-very-diversified period of time, GWTW captured my imagination and enthralled my emotions. I wanted to know the characters, to whack them on the head if necessary, to see what it was like to sew a dress from curtains, to learn the history of our neighbors to the south, to find out what grits really tasted like. In other words, the world of GWTW was as different and foreign to me as The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. I didn’t identify with Scarlett, but she was spoiled and headstrong and fascinating to explore through Margaret Mitchell’s writing….
What books would you choose to Live in for Awhile?
This post is information-oriented, for those who might be interested in traveling to Easter Island and want to know a bit about the ins and outs. Pretty photos are forthcoming in future posts, I promise!
Last we left off, we were booked into the Hilton Garden Inn by the Santiago Airport. We had no problem booking and catching the shuttle (done at the hotel’s front desk) to the airport for our departure to Rapa Nui (Easter Island), but the airport was an absolute zoo once we were inside. We didn’t know it at the time – we thought so many Chileans were traveling because it was their summer – but we had, quite by chance, decided to travel to Easter Island during the annual Tapati Festival, during which the Rapa Nui-ans celebrate their culture, traditions, music, dance, and athletics, some of which are quite unique. This link has photos and videos to show you.
Arriving during festival time was a surprise for us, but it’s a cool time to visit the island because every night you can go down to the festival area and see the competitions, mingle with Chileans, or arrange to watch some events (we were there to see the Moai, so only attended one event – more on that another day – but you could organize a trip around attending several events if you wished). I had heard about the festival, but we organized our trip around a 4-night cruise through the Patagonian fjords (to come!). We planned backward and forward from our cruise departure date of February 13th, much further south in Punta Arenas. So we happened to book flights to Rapa Nui during the festival as part of booking backward from our cruise.
The festival explained the busy-ness of the Santiago airport! Also, our flight was delayed six hours. There wasn’t really an explanation for this, other than there are only one or maybe two flights a day to Rapa Nui, and if one is delayed (they’re about six hours long), then the next is delayed, and so forth.
So if you’re planning on traveling to Rapa Nui, be prepared to be flexible (and cheerful during your wait in the airport). Also, I’ve never quite encountered this before, but when you board your LAN flight (or United Airlines coming back from South America), be prepared that someone might already be in your seat. I have no clue why – they’re trying to get a better seat and think the person who bought the seat won’t notice? This happened to us on United coming back during a red-eye and happened to someone else on our leg to Rapa Nui. If it happens to you, the flight attendants will quickly get things sorted out.
Travel Tip! I have no clue why, but we booked our flights through Expedia and on LAN airlines, and for reasons completely unknown to Moi, my husband and I were able to score Business Class seats (the kind that recline into little beds) round trip for $600 LESS than Economy seats. My sister-in-law booked a couple of days after I did, and their seats cost $300 more than ours and were only Business Class one way.
So…check flight costs often and be prepared to pounce when you see a deal! This was the first time (and so far only time) my husband and I have traveled Business Class, and it was quite the treat.
The Rapa Nui airport was every bit as chaotic as the Santiago airport. Travel Trip! You can buy your Park passes (which you need to visit the Quarry and Orongo – the main two archeological sites – at the airport. Look for the kiosk after you get off your plane and before you enter the airport arrival area to fetch your luggage.
Our first taste of Pisco Sours Rapa Nui style (with a fruit juice), very late January 30th. Our group walked from our cabanas to the main street and popped into the closest restaurant for a meal of French fries, chicken, and gravy (like a sort of Rapa Nui poutine). Steve and I had tasted Pisco in Peru six years earlier, had even brought some home to give to unwitting guests – but that was straight out of the flask. On Rapa Nui, we quickly learned we preferred the lemon Pisco Sour. We had to sample a different restaurant’s or bar’s Pisco Sours every night to determine which was the best. Better than wine-tasting, IMO….
There are plenty of accommodation choices on Easter Island, but during festival time things can book up very fast. We wanted to be walking distance to town and not spend $300 a night, so we chose Cabanas Tautira, which perfectly fit our needs and was very economical for all the space you get.
Jorge, our host, met us at the airport, which was utterly chaotic. My luggage was one of the last pieces to deplane, so we were there for awhile. Jorge greeted us with flower necklaces (quite common practice, we noticed) and drove us around the town to orient us before settling us into two adjoining “cabanas,” which had two bedrooms each (one with two single beds, which we used as a large walk-in closet), the large bed facing the yard, a living room and kitchenette, and a bathroom. The walls of our living room/kitchenette abutted the walls of BILly and SILly’s cabana:
That’s BILly sitting at their table. My only quibble about the cabanas was that I have a lot of hair on my head and could have used a change of towels during our five nights there. Now, I could have asked Jorge for a change of towels and I am sure he would have provided one, but I didn’t, so those towels were a little, uh, crusty by the time we left.
The other thing to be prepared for is when they decide to mow the lawn at the cabanas, because they do so with a weed-whacker type thing. 🙂 The grass is pretty dry in summer, so if your sliding doors are open you might find grass and twigs and such flying into your bedroom or all over your drying rack with your freshly handwashed laundry. But, honestly, that’s part of the charm of the cabanas.
The location couldn’t be beat. We could walk to town, and Jorge rented us a very clean vehicle for two days. Vehicles are just as easy to rent “downtown,” but it just made things simpler to rent them from Jorge.
If you popped by to see pictures of the Moai, do not despair, they are coming! Just not today. I know, I’m bad. The next Easter Island post should appear Thursday, March 31st.
Any questions about Easter Island? Just drop them in the comments thread and I’ll do my best to answer.
Week 1 of the #Listifylife Spring Challenge presents that most perplexing of issues…. What is Spring for You?
To me, Spring is…
Birthday Season! Between March 31st and June 3rd we celebrate at least eight family birthdays I can think of, between parents, brother-in-law, daughter-in-law, son, niece and my DH.
Planting Flowers I’ll Forget to Water Last summer we did masses of outdoor renovations, completely tearing up our “Fred Flintstone” driveway (complete with decades of frost heaves), taking away loads of natural clay, replacing with clean fill, paving with asphalt, and replacing our old carport with a beautiful new one that goes much better with our house. Along the way, we lost the two gardens outside my kitchen door. We have a nice new pathway I’ll line with flower pots this spring. Let’s see if I’m any better at remembering to water pots than I am at gardens….
Counting Down to Seeing my Eldest Son Again in July! I only get to see E.S. in the summers, because he teaches at a B.C.-curriculum high school in Shanghai. I try to forget the countdown from September until March, because otherwise it gets too depressing. But now that spring is upon us, I’m counting down to early/mid-July when he’ll be home for his annual visit.
