Sunday, December 3, 2017

Easter Island and Traffic





How is traffic on Easter Island? In 1990 nearly all roads were dust roads as you might see on the picture above, which shows the access road to Rano Raraku. When I walked to Rano Raraku in 1990 I had seen like three cars, one of these was the one of a couple, that gave me a lift in both directions.

Nowadays quite a lot of roads are paved, but there are still some dirt roads left. Someone has loaded a video of about 35 sec. about the heavy traffic in the down town eh village area of Hanga Roa [1].

Someone suggested [2]: “Fortunately, it’s a small island with very little traffic.” But very little traffic doesn’t mean no traffic. And accidents happen; see picture below.

The car on the left side is off road and lies on its roof

But as traffic isn’t really heavy and you are circumspect and drive carefully, you might rent a car. However, you can’t insure the car. So, you would have to pay for any damage. If spare part have to be flown in, it might get expensive.

What are the options to get around? There is no public transportation [3]; the same soured talks about a “a Hop-On Hop-Off bus called "Ara Moai" departing from the Catholic Church”, which I haven’t seen, while visiting downtown. But you can walk, rent a bicycle, rent a horse, join a tour, rent a car, fly helicopter (please don’t as it generates too much noise), or fly a small plane (see helicopter), or take a taxi. Transport from and to Mataveri Airport are usually arranged; or you take your backpack and stroll into Hanga Roa. There are crosswalks but no traffic lights.

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