With our visit Easter Island being canceled, we had seven sea days in a row. And it would have been longer if we didn’t schedule a “drive by” of Pitcairn Island. For this historians, this is the island that the mutineers landed after the Mutiny on the Bounty. It’s a lovely island, and the first land we’ve seen in a week. This British Overseas Territory has a population of 37. Not 37,000. Not 37 hundred. Thirty seven.

There is no way we could visit them (image 400 cruise passengers on an island of 37), so half of the islanders came to us.

In almost 400 days on Silversea I’ve never seen this. Our main bar and reception area was converted into a shopping area. While the shop keepers were setting up, one of them spoke to a slide package in our show lounge. Highlights:

• Rain provides all the water they use
• They’ve recently set up solar arrays, which has reduced the use of the diesel generators by 90%
• 30% of the island attends the Seventh-day Adventist Church
• Quarterly a supply ship from New Zealand arrives with cargo. The ship also has 12 berths, if anyone is traveling to/from the Island.
• They have “slipper lobsters” – which do not have big, pinching claws. I have never heard of those.
• The tourist site is here

Most of the stuff being sold were carved driftwood, t-shirts and local honey. Which I do not need. I almost bought a “Pitcairn Island Police” patch, tho…

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Here’s another “we didn’t make it to Easter Island” thing. They are testing one of the way some historians and scientists think the moai (big heads) were moved…