I don't think there have been many detailed reports in a while so I thought I'd share my recent experiences (end of March 2025). I know DeathSlam went there recently but I think I had a better experience!

As part of a bigger trip to deep South America, my daughter and I headed to Rapa Nui for a few days. We had stayed a restful night in Santiago in Providencia, and were once again back at the airport. I'd originally booked a flight at 9:10 am, so not too early, but the flight times were changed since then and we were bumped to an 8:15 flight. I never confirmed the change, and on certain days of the week, there are 2 daily flights to Rapa Nui. So last night I changed our flight time to the later one, at 10:35, so my daughter could sleep in a bit, and it was much appreciated. We arrived in plenty of time and went through the special document check for travelers to Rapa Nui (Easter Island, Isla de Pascua). You have to go through a similar process like border control, but not only is your passport checked, your accommodation booking and return flight booking are verified as well. It only took a few extra minutes because we were well prepared but I could see some people on the side scrambling last minute to find their documents and fill in the pre-departure form online.



You receive a PDI (immigration control) form just like you do when entering Chile once you've passed all this, and it gets handed over at flight boarding time.



We had plenty of time after that in a very busy lounge, the Salones VIP Pacific Club that was partially below grade level.



The food wasn't very appealing.



The bar wasn't open yet.



But it served its purpose to pass the time where we could have some snacks and drinks and relax before our next flight. Another LATAM Dreamliner flight today.



J on this route is consistently available for approx $800 US round trip if you use a VPN and the Chile website.





The Santiago airport has a little forest in the middle of it. Very unexpected for such a dry, dusty place.



The dry air makes it a good place for long term aircraft storage though... we saw a few very interesting, ancient aircraft in the maintenance area.





We rose above the unfortunate ever-present layer of smog over Santiago into a brilliant blue sky.



And away from the city, it already started to clear up a bit.



Heading west, we passed over the rich agricultural and winelands of the Mallarauco and Maipo Valleys.





And before long, we were leaving the mainland of South America and over the Pacific Ocean for the next 5 hours.





The view of just blue and clouds was broken up only by the Juan Fernandez Islands, about 700 km off the coast of Chile.



Lunchtime! Accompanied by a delicious Chilean red wine blend.





The air pollution from Chile reached almost 1000 km out into the ocean.



My daughter shared her after lunch chocolates with her new stuffie.



There was really nothing else to see until we were minutes away from landing. Mataveri International Aiport (IPC) is another one of those very small airports, where the plane has to turn around at the end of the runway to taxi back to the terminal. Rapa Nui itself is the most remote and isolated inhabited place on the planet. It is 3800 km from Santiago and Papeete, Tahiti, the next closest airport, is over 4200 km away, continuing west. Because of this, only one aircraft can be past the halfway point between Santiago and Mataveri at a time, as the alternate diversion airport in case of an issue at Mataveri is all the way back to Santiago. And checking the flight history for our flight, sometimes this happens! They can get all the way there and then have the airport socked in with thick fog, etc, and then passengers end up on a ten hour flight to nowhere. It's really far away from everything out here!!



The earlier flight that were booked on until yesterday is getting ready to return to Santiago as we arrive.



The captain invited my daughter to come to the cockpit for some photos on arrival as he was suitably impressed by her flight logbook. How many places are there going to be palm trees right outside the windshield of a Dreamliner!



Ah, here we are now. What a lovely place to step outside onto stairs to deplane.







Iorana is the Rapa Nui greeting: it means both Hello and Goodbye.



This airport terminal is pretty sweet. A thatched roof hut in the style of the traditional Rapa Nui house.



With honu (sea turtles) in the tile floor.





And a carved wooden whale...



This was the extent of the entire arrivals area. Only one plane at a time here, remember!



After our luggage quickly came out, we were greeted by a staff member from the hotel, Juan, who welcomed us with fresh flower leis.

We are staying at Hotel Ohana, a newer, very small hotel on the outskirts of the main town of Rapa Nui, Hanga Roa. Hanga means bay in Rapa Nui and we'll see the word everywhere over the next few days. Anyway, the hotel only has 9 rooms and was just gorgeous.

















We checked out the pool, and being unheated, it was a bit chilly, but still refreshing after a day of travel.






We ventured into town via taxi for dinner at a market style terrace joint right across the road from the ocean. One of the outlets did pizza (for my daughter) and another one smashburgers (for me). I also got a Pisco Sour since we were technically still in Chile.









After dinner, we walked around a bit to explore. We stopped in the "fancy" supermarket of the island to pick up some snacks.



There was a bottle of Krug on the top shelf. Wonder how long it's been sitting up there. The interesting thing is that food and drink were the same price here as they were in Santiago, even in these small stores. I assume the Chilean government covers the costs of shipping everything from Valparaiso (by sea) or on the LATAM flight.



The town is really small, about 7,000 people. Lots of side streets are dirt and of course being tropical and on the leeward side of the island there is lush vegetation everywhere.





Oh yeah, and there were dogs literally everywhere in town. Apparently most of them have homes; they come out to visit tourists during the day to beg for snacks and attention. Then back home at dark for dinner and bed. They were all pretty well fed (ie: chubby!). We did not have much success trying to hail a taxi on the street - the few we saw driving by had passengers already - so we walked all the way back to the restaurant and asked them to call us one, which was no problem at all.



So ends our first afternoon and evening here. Looking forward to the next few days!