Archaeological sights in Pacific
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A
Otatara Pa
Wooden palisades, carved pou (memorial posts) and a carved gate help bring this pa site to life. An hour-long loop walk across grassy hills passes barely-discernible archaeological remains but affords terrific views of the surrounding countryside. From the city head southwest on Taradale Rd and Gloucester St. Turn right into Springfield Rd just before the river.
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Nambaiyufa Amphitheatre
The Nambaiyufa Amphitheatre, near Chuave, has rock paintings.
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Badrulchau
In Babeldaob's far north is a field with rows of large basalt monoliths known as Badrulchau, the origin of which is unknown. There are 37 stones, some weighing up to 4500kg (5 tons). Many of the surrounding hillsides were once elaborately terraced into steps and pyramids; it's thought construction began around AD 100 and was abandoned around 1600.
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Aboriginal Rock Engravings
On the clifftop fairways of Bondi Golf Club, a short walk north from Bondi Beach, you’ll find Eora Aboriginal rock engravings (look for the fenced areas about 20m southeast of the enormous chimney, and watch out for flying golf balls). It seems inappropriate by today’s standards, but the original carvings were regrooved by Waverley Council in the 1960s to help preserve them. Some of the images are hard to distinguish, though you should be able to make out the marine life and the figure of a man.
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Sigatoka Sand Dunes
One of Fiji's natural highlights, these impressive dunes are a ripple of peppery monoliths skirting the shoreline near the mouth of the Sigatoka River. Windblown and rugged, they stand around 5km (3.1mi) long, up to 1km (0.6mi) wide and on average about 20m (65ft) high, rising to about 60m (197ft) at the western end.
Do not expect golden Sahara-like dunes, as the fine sand is a grey-brown colour and largely covered with vines and shrubs. The dunes have been forming over millions of years and archaeological excavations here have uncovered pottery more than 2600 years old, as well as one of the largest burial sites in the Pacific.
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Mu'a
The Mu'a area contains the richest concentration of archaeological remnants in Tonga. There are 28 royal stone tombs (langi) in the area (15 of which are monumental), built with enormous limestone slabs carried by canoes either from nearby Pangaimotu, Motutapu and other parts of Tongatapu, or possibly from as far away as Ha'apai or even Futuna.
The structure closest to the main road is the Paepae 'o Tele'a (Platform of Tele'a), a monumental, pyramid-like stone memorial. Tele'a was a Tu'i Tonga (king) who reigned during the 16th century, though his body is probably not inside.
The other structure, the Langi Namoala, has a fine example of a fonualoto (vault for a corpse) on…
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Cossack
It may be a fair distance from Karijini, but the ghost town of Cossack and its open-air museum is well worth a visit. Providing an insight into the Pilbara's frontier past, it was a place of some (relative) prominence in the 19th century, only to be abandoned by the middle of the next.
Originally named Tien Tsin (after the barque that carried Walter Padbury, the region's first settler), the town went through a succession of name- and identity-changes in its short life. Sheep grazing, then gold mining, then pearling were the industries to which Cossack (like the Pilbara in general) yoked its fortunes during the latter half of the 19th century. It was pearling, in…
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