It's a bird, it's a plane, no it's Birdman!

Well, kind of! ;) 28 hours after leaving Canadian soil we arrived on Easter Island yesterday! After checking into our hostel we decided to do a little sightseeing around THE town (yes, most everyone on the island, all 5000 people, live in Hanga Roa). The entire island is only 58km and aside from the landing strip and one main street, the rest of the island is a national park. We headed down to the coast and saw our first moai standing tall beside the ocean- quite a sight! From there we got a little adventurous and decided to hike the Orongo Trail up to one of the 3 volcanic craters that shaped the island. It's also where the historical Birdman competition took place! In ancient times, the tribes on the island would hold a competition to see which tribe would have control. One man from each tribe had to race down the side of a cliff and swim across to an island on a long thing made of straw through strong currents and big surf. They had to retrieve a particular bird egg from the island, swim back, and scale back up the cliffside to win control for that year. Its beautiful up there but it's awfully windy- luckily the wind was blowing us away from the crater! Pictures to come!