“Try to avoid becoming a walking cliché and don’t get involved with the islanders”.

Those were the wise words of Chilean anthropologist, Patricia Varas who has been visiting the island on and off for the last 30 years. Although I heeded her words, I now understand why the women looked at me a bit shiftily. According to Patricia wedding rings and children are no barrier to their men running off with the tourists. And infidelities are a fact of life.

Age doesn’t seem to matter either, Patricia told me it is pretty normal to see OAP’s losing their heads and sauntering off into the sunset with a local, 30 years younger than them.

It must be something to do with the culture. Although this tiny South Pacific island is owned by Chile, the people have a lot more in common with their Polynesian neighbours.

Most of the men are over six foot tall and due to a life style of fishing, surfing, farming and building work, they have the kind of physic an avid gym goer would be envious of. And many of the women could happily enter a Miss Universe competition. And then there is the dancing - men and women think nothing of shaking their booty and giving come hither looks in their traditional dances, in a way which is completely impossible for the average Briton to emulate.

But there’s another attraction which easily competes with the locals and has put them in the running to be one of the New 7 Wonders of the World and that’s the Moai. These huge statues are carved out of volcanic rock and can be up to 10 metres high. There are some 900 of them strewn across the grass lands of Rapa Nui, as the locals call the island.

The guides at Casas Rapa Nui, the Explora hotel, where I stayed don’t believe in packing you into a mini bus and ticking off the sites. They like to take things slower, so that you really appreciate what you are going to see.

And that is how I found myself hiking through country side, which considering how far I had travelled looked suspiciously like Scotland.

Easter Island is largely treeless due to the exploits of its ancestors. Although historians have various different theories, there is evidence to show that the island once had a lush forest of palm trees, but in the 17th century it is thought that the native Easter Islanders completely deforested their island. They used the wood to build their houses and canoes and according to some, to transport the statues.

We were on route to Rano Raraku the quarry where it all started. Here you can find different statues in various stages of completion. With their broad flat noses and long ears the statues were built in the image of the island’s ancestors. Our knowledgeable local guide Francesca explained that, as their sculpting techniques developed, so did their prowess and the later statues have more defined features. Some of them weigh up to 11 tonnes - and to this day experts are perplexed as to how they got to their final resting place, the Ahu, as the plate forms they were lined up on are called.

Rano Raraku is an ideal place to get a sense of the island. The quarry is also a volcanic crater which provided the material for the statues. Our guide cajoled us to the top of it, where we were awarded with a spectacular view of wild horses butting statues and the glittering South Pacific Sea on either side of the tiny 64 square mile island.

You will doubtless have seen endless photos of the Moai standing majestically on their plate forms staring silently out across the island. But, every tourist I spoke to agreed that it doesn’t compare to seeing them in person.

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