Just 13 miles long and seven miles wide

Easter Island rises like a fortress from the waves surrounded by thousands of miles of ocean in every direction

People first arrived here less than 1 000 years ago

Most of what we know about their civilisation can only be pieced together from the relics that remain

It is a strange and desolate place

The most striking features in this bleak and windswept landscape are the hundreds of giant stone statues known as moai

Thought to be carved in the likeness of chiefs or ancestors

It's difficult to believe that an advanced culture capable of carving and erecting these monoliths grew up in such a barren landscape

The truth is it didn't

When those first colonisers discovered Easter Island this was a paradise

These empty cliffs were once home to the largest seabird colonies in the South Pacific