Honeymoon on the Cook Islands

We had an amazing time on the Cook Islands. It was a perfect place for a honeymoon! Everyone was very friendly and we had a relaxing trip. We spent 11 days, 10 nights on the Cook Islands and think this was the perfect amount of time. We felt like we did everything we wanted to do and didn't miss out on anything. The island of Rarotonga is only 20 miles around and 7 miles across so there isn't too much we could have missed. Here are some notes from our trip.

Sunday May 7
We had a great Sunday brunch in the afternoon following the wedding. Sunday night we had a relaxing dinner and were getting excited, and a little nervous, about the long flight to Rarotonga. It was a place we had never been before and we didn't know really what to expect. We had a lot of information from different web sites and a few friends (thanks Kiz, Bob, & Dot!) so we were prepared. The flight left LAX at 11:45pm, expected arrival was 12 hrs later.

Monday May 8
We had a brief stopover in Tahiti. We all had to get off the plane. Many people stayed in Tahiti, and the rest of us either were going on to Rarotonga or to Auckland. We arrived just before sunrise. It was quite warm and humid still and we got our first taste of what the tropical islands in this area were going to be like.

We arrived on Rarotonga on time at 9:00am local time (same time zone as Hawaii - 3 hrs earlier than California). The landing was good even though we landed in a pretty steady rain shower. The airport was tiny. We presented our immigration form and picked up our bags. One of the officers asked if we had any food. Melinda said she had a Nutrigrain bar and some goldfish. The officer looked at her funny and said GoldFish? That was pretty funny. We got through and were now on the street. We were immediately greeted and asked where we were staying. We said the Shangri-La. The taxi for us was waiting and before we knew it we were on our way.

The taxi was a bit old and rundown, rips in the seats, bare floors, and it smelled a little funny too. As we were driving through the rain looking at the side of the road, everything else looked a little older and not as up to date as we were used to. We began to wonder what we had gotten ourselves into!

We arrived at the Shangri-La about 15 minutes after leaving the airport. The individual cottages/bungalows looked great. The grounds were well kept and it was right next to the beach. We met with the owner, Elliot Smith. He is quite a character - a retired judge from California and travel author. We chatted with him for quite some time. He gave us our key and we went to our little bungalow and unpacked. We were pretty tired from the long flight and beginning to get a little hungry to.

We spent the rest of the afternoon in the main town of Avarau. We found the bus schedule and we were ready to head into town. While standing on the side of the road, one of our neighbors at the Shangri-La were driving into town and offered us a ride. That worked out well. Once we got there, we walked around a little and had some lunch, found an ATM to get some more New Zealand dollars, and got some groceries so we didn't have to eat out every day. We rode the bus back to our cottage. The bus was pretty packed and several people were standing. When we got back home, we had an early dinner and ended up going to bed at 5:30pm!

Tuesday May 9
We got up about 6am and headed off to the beach to do some kayaking and explore the islets a little. The beach was pretty empty and we were mostly to ourselves. There were a few dogs running around. It was a little windy, but we had a great time. We got back and put the kayaks away and spent the rest of the morning relaxing and reading on our patio.

We walked down the beach for lunch at Sails Restaurant. The food was good and it was also right on the beach. In the afternoon we did some snorkeling. For dinner we walked down to Pacific Resort restaurant. It was raining on and off while we had dinner. The dinner was good here too. We walked back to our cottage on the beach in the dark.

Wednesday May 10
Today we went to the Cultural Village and did the full day tour. The morning we had various presentations on the history and culture of the Cook Islanders. We learned about the government history, various fishing techniques, the stages of a coconut, hunting, and old tribal signaling techniques with drums. We had a great lunch with lots of local foods - some soft spongy coconut, rukau (spinach like from the Taro plant leaves), paw-paw (papaya), chicken, and a banana. It was a great lunch.

The afternoon we got on the bus and had a tour of the island. We stopped at the museum and one shop along the way. We liked the morning tour much better than the afternoon bus ride. It was still pretty informative though.

After getting back to the Shangri-La, we were pretty tired and made some spaghetti in our cottage and went to bed early again.

Thursday May 11
We got up early this morning and went on a nature walk with a local guide Pa. We were the only 2 people on the walk with him today so we had our own private guide. He is an herbalist and knows a lot about all the plants and fruits on the island. He told us about a lot of the plants and what he uses for different medicinal purposes. He even had his own natural mosquito repellant made of coconut and various other oils. It worked pretty good. Pa was also an interesting fellow with blonde dreadlocks. He hiked around barefoot with just a pair of running shorts. We liked the walk and it wasn't too strenous. We told him we were thinking of going on the cross island trek with him too. He told us it was a highly technical walk and we signed up to do that with him on the next day. At the end of our nature walk his wife had prepared lunch - tuna sandwich with Papaya's and we drank some coconut milk too.

The rest of the afternoon we walked around the beach a little bit. We walked down to the Internet Cafe, had a smoothy and emailed our family.

For dinner that night we rode the bus back into town and went to the Staircase Restaurant for their Island Night show. We had a great dinner with local foods, again with some rukau, which I really liked. The show was great with dancers and drumming. It was pretty entertaining and really reasonably priced too.

Friday May 12
Today was our cross island trek with Pa. He picked us up in the morning and we had a pretty good size group of about a dozen people. The hiking was through a very dense forest area. It reminded us of the TV show Lost. It was muddy in some parts, but it would have been worse if we had gone the next week as it had rained some more over the weekend. There were some parts where we had to climb a steep trail and hang onto the tree limbs to help us up. It was another humid day, a little cloudy and not too hot, so it was a good day to hike. We stopped at the 400 meter peak for a little break. The views were great and there was green wherever you looked. It was amazing on how green the island was. After a little bit further we stopped at a creek and had lunch. We also had a bunch of papaya and apples along the way. Pa carried all of our lunches and some of our water bottles in his backpack.

As Pa told us on Thursday, this really was a highly technical walk. We had to constantly watch where we were stepping and even then we were slipping and sliding on the muddy trail. We did make it across and it was a good experience. We were glad we had a guide, as it would have been very easy to get lost and not know where to go. Some parts of the trail didn't even look like a trail we were supposed to go through.

Saturday May 13
After all the hiking from Friday, we were pretty tired. We did go into town again for the Saturday market. We bought a few souveniers and had a nice lunch too. We spent the afternoon mainly relaxing.

Sunday May 14
Today we went to one of the local CICC (Cook Islands Christian Church) for Sunday worship. It was mainly in Cook Island's Maori, but they had some parts in English. It was a good experience and they had some sandwiches and lunch for us after the service. The singing was really good. It was kind of hot in the church, they had fans mounted on all the beams throughout the church.

In the afternoon we kayaked to the Fruits of Rarotonga. It took us about an hour and a half to get there. We were going against the wind. We were told this was the best place for snorkeling so we had to try it out. The snorkeling was pretty good and we got a few pictures with our underwater camera. We didn't really see a whole lot of colorful fish, but there were a few that swam by. They were pretty friendly, I guess they were expecting to be fed, but we didn't bring any fish food for them. The lagoon is pretty shalow too, only about 6 feet deep, 10 feet in some of the deeper parts. The barrier reef surrounds the whole island protecting it from the waves. There is a lot of coral all around so it's good to wear the reef shoes / aqua socks to prevent from getting a reef cut.

Monday May 15
Today we slept in after all the strenous activities from the last few days. We were pretty lazy in the morning. In the afternoon we decided that was enough rest and we rented some bikes for the day. We ended up riding all around the island (20 miles). We stopped a few places along the way to check out some restaurants to see if we would like to try them out. This was pretty helpful as we did see some we didn't like and veto'd. It took us about 3 hrs to ride around the island.

For dinner we took the bus and went to Club Raro. We had a nice dinner and some fruity drinks. We were right next to the beach and it was very pleasant dinner.

Tuesday May 16
This morning we took our bikes to the Maire Nui Gardens for brunch. We were riding in the pouring rain. When we got there it wasn't open. We later found out they are no longer open for brunch. The day before we asked one of the workers and we were told they would be open in the morning for brunch. Even the sign said it was open for brunch at 9:30am.

We rode our bikes over to the Pacific Resort near our cottage and had breakfast there instead. We returned our bikes after breakfast and spent the rest of the afternoon relaxing and reading on the beach.

For dinner tonight we went to the Spaghetti House and had a good dinner.

Wednesday May 17
Today we rode the bus into town and had brunch at The Cafe. It was a good breakfast. In the afternoon we did some more kayaking, snorkeling, and had a picnic dinner on one of the motu's (islets) near our cottage.

Thursday May 18
Our last day on the island. Our flight was at 11:15pm. Since we needed to check out of the cottage at 6pm, we decided to rent a car so we could drive to dinner and then to the airport and just keep the luggage in the car. Driving in the Cook Islands is on the left side of the road, and the driver is on the right side of the car. When we got our car, we saw it was a stick shift. Not only did I have to get used to driving on the left side of the road and the right side of the car, but I also had to learn how to drive a stick shift and shift with my left hand. I had only driven a stick once before. I managed to do pretty well though.

In the later part of the morning we went on a tour of the Takitumu Preserve. We weren't really expecting this to be a hike like we did with Pa, so we had on shorts and a t-shirt. It was quite a trek, again through the jungle like with Pa. Here we did get quite a few mosquito bites and were itching them for several days.

In the afternoon we finished packing up. We went to the Spaghetti House again for dinner and then off to the airport. Our flight left at 11:15pm. We had a 2 hr stopover in Tahiti. By the time we got back on the plane and were in the air, it was about 6am California time.

Friday May 19
We landed at 2pm and were really tired from the flight. We didn't sleep very well on the plane. We got back to our house, had some dinner, and went to bed. We didn't wake up until 11am on Saturday (which was 8am Cook Island time).

All in all it was a wonderful honeymoon and experience in tropical paradise! We would recommend going to the Cook Islands to anyone ready for some relaxation and adventure!