Tapati Rapa Nui Festival

What is the Tapati Festival?

Called the Tapati Rapa Nui, or translated literally as Rapa Nui Week, the Tapati Festival is Easter Island's important annual cultural and sporting event held during the first two weeks of February each year. 

Need to Know

The festival hosts a wide range of activities including song and dance competitions, traditional sporting events like swimming, canoeing, horse racing, the Rapa Nui triathlon and the Haka Pei, Easter Island's famous extreme sport. 

For the Haka Pei, young and brave participants wearing only the hami or the traditional loincloth and adorned by takona or body paintings race downhill by sliding, using a rustic sled made of banana trunks, in dizzying speeds reaching 80 km/hour.  The participant who travels the greatest distance from the launch point wins.  

Did You Know

Each year, the festival crowns its Queen of the Tapati or Ariki Tapati.  

Chile's Easter Island is the home to a thriving community of diverse cultures including Rapa Nui who are the aboriginal Polynesian inhabitants of the island. The festivities began in the 1970s to promote and maintain the Rapa Nui culture to the islanders and their children and has since grown to include the island's visitors.  

While this welcoming festival attracts international guests, it remains under the direction and control of the locals, keeping the festivities authentic and original.

Coronavirus is causing a number of event cancellations; we provide event website links on each page for you to check the latest updates.

See our Coronavirus page here.