If you have always been intrigued by the mysterious moai - the giant stone statues of Rapa Nui, also known as Easter Island - and they are on your must-do list, do not delay.

Make your way, whenever you can, to this small, rocky, triangular-shaped and extremely isolated island in the South Pacific, 9,354 kilometres due east of Brisbane.

"These objects are very friable, they're fragile, they're not going to last forever," Dr Jo Anne Van Tilburg, an American archaeologist who has been studying the moai for 30 years, says...