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Cook Islands: Rarotonga

Sandy and I really enjoyed our trip to the Cook Islands last year. Many months ago when we saw that we could still get good prices on air fares there, we planned another trip for this year. Then we talked to our friend Mary Beth about it. She decided to come along based on the rave reviews that she heard from us. More likely it was the amazing description and photos of our trip that were on the Dog Blog.

Hawaiian Airlines flies once a week, arriving on Saturday night and returning the next day, so a lot of packages feature eight nights in the Cook Islands. This time we decided to split our time between two islands, five nights on Rarotonga (where we had been before) and three nights on Aitutaki. With a population of ten thousand people, Rarotonga has most of the population of the Cook Islands, as well as quite a few resorts, shops and restaurants. It's still uncrowded compared to other tropical destinations like Hawaii. Aitutaki is 160 miles away, with a population of less than two thousand people and only a handfull of resorts. It's an atoll with a large, beautiful lagoon and feels even more remote and uncrowded than Rarotonga. Or so I've heard. I was anxious to visit and see for myself.

Unfortunately, some time after we booked our trip, Hawaiian Airlines changed their schedule. The flight from Rarotonga to Honolulu used to leave at 10 pm. That gave us a lot of time to fly back from Aitutaki to connect with our flight home. We had a lot of margin in case of any delays due to weather or whatever.

The new departure time was a little before 1 pm. That still worked but since the flight back to the US was only once a week, missing it would be a major problem. We decided to play it safe and just spend all our time in the Cook Islands on Rarotonga. Fortunately we were able to cancel our hotel on Aitutaki and extend our hotel on Rarotonga. The new departure time also meant that we got to Honolulu in the evening, too late to even try to get home the same day. We considered that a feature not a bug, and made plans to stay over for two days in Hawaii, just like we did last year.

It's a long trip to the Cook Islands. We started by flying to San Francisco and staying overnight at a Hilton near the airport. From there it was a short walk to the New England Lobster Market & Eatery. I'm not a fan of sea food but Sandy and Mary Beth are. I was ok with it because they did have a sourdough grilled cheese sandwhich on the menu which turned out to be quite good.

After dinner we had a glass of wine in the hotel bar and watched a little bit of the first game of the World Series. Online it had seemed like everyone outside of LA was rooting against the Dodgers because they seemed to have a big advantage with their huge payroll. Still, I was surprised that when the Blue Jays scored a run the whole bar erupted in cheers. Since we were at a hotel I assume that the clientele was a fair cross section of people from across the country, and probably not many Canadians.

Next morning we left for the airport at 5:30 am to catch an 8 am flight. That was a lot of margin, but with the government shutdown in its fourth week, we were nervous about TSA delays. Arriving that early, there was definitely no problem.

Then we had a six hour flight to Hawaii, a five hour layover in Honolulu (plus an extra hour delay because the plane we were catching was late getting in), and another six hour flight to Rarotonga. Even with the time change traveling westward, we didn't arrive until 11:30 at night. A long day to travel a long way.

One interesting thing happened en route. While we were eating lunch in the Honolulu airport, I spotted Seiya Suziki at a nearby table. He's the right fielder for the Chicago Cubs. Since the Brewers and Cubs play a lot and I watch the games on tv, I was sure it was him. Quite a coincidence because I was pretty sure I spotted Freddie Freeman at a restaurant in Miami Beach back in May. Sandy wasn't convinced that time but this time she agreed with me. Suzuki's wife is an olympic athlete so we found her picture online too. Definitely a match. She was even wearing a sparkly top that said "Chicago". No, I didn't bug him for an autograph or a selfie.

We were staying at the same hotel on Rarotonga as last year, the Sunset Beach Resort. We were even able to get a beachfront unit again, although Mary Beth booked later than we did and had a room in the pool area. By the time we got to the resort and were in our room, we were ready to crash. Even with the three hour time change from San Francisco, it was after midnight. But we couldn't go to bed just yet.

The previous year we had one minor problem. One day we bought some food at the local market and left it on the counter in the kitchen overnight. The next morning there was a swarm of ants all over it. The food had to be thrown away. I hunted down all the ants in the room and sprayed around the outside of the unit. From then on we put all food in sealed ziplock bags or in the refrigerator and never had a problem again. It was a nuisance but not that big a deal. I had a similar problem at a hotel in Kathmandu on my last trip to Nepal in 2017, so I knew that things like that happen sometimes when you travel.

Well this time the ants were there waiting for us when we arrived. Maybe the cleaners had left the door open while they cleaned the room. Maybe the previous guests had left food out. Maybe the unit had just been empty for a few days and no one had sprayed for a while. Whatever the reason, I spent the next half hour hunting down all the ants that had gotten in. Fortunately there was bug spray under the sink so I went outside and sprayed around the door and windows. When the place was finally cleared we were able to go to bed.

That mostly took care of things but we did have more ant problems this year than last. We were careful with food and trash and I did spray outside every day. Even with those precautions, we usually would find a couple of ants wandering around inside our room every day. Not a major problem but it was annoying. That was the only complaint that we had for the whole week though.

The next day was Sunday and the following day was Gospel Day, a national holiday. Most shops and some restaurants were closed both days. Even the bus had a very limited schedule, so we stayed close to the resort. That was fine with us. We walked along the beach to Black Rock, a local landmark. The Maori believe it is the place where the spirits of the dead depart Rarotonga for their journey to the afterlife.

From Black Rock we climbed up to the main road and walked to the nearby 24 hour market, which was open even on Sunday and holidays. We stocked up on important supplies, like Diet Coke and snacks. But mostly we hung out at the beach. There were comfortable chairs in the shade of the palm trees that grew along the edge of the sand. The water in the lagoon was a beautiful turquoise and we could watch the surf crashing against the barrier reef about 150 yards from shore. Best of all, there was rarely anyone there. Sometimes there would be a handful of people from our resort sitting in the chairs. Maybe someone would walk by on the beach. Much of the time though, we had this beautiful spot all to ourselves. That's what Sandy and I love about the Cook Islands.

The next day, when the buses started running on their normal schedule, we did venture into town. I was excited to try a place that I had read about called The Waffle Shack. I'm not a big fan of eating breakfast, or of most breakfast foods, unlike my wife. When we do go out for breakfast I usually order waffles. This place featured waffles with ice cream. I had to admit that got my interest and I was excited to go and try them out. We all skipped eating at the hotel that morning, planning to make the waffle place our first stop in town. By the time we got there it was late morning and we were all pretty hungry. In fact, when it turned out to be a food truck rather than a "real" restaurant, Sandy and Mary Beth wanted to go somewhere else where they could get something more substantial. Oh well. I was outvoted.

Next we tried the pizza place across the street, but they didn't serve pizza for lunch, only for dinner. Swing and a miss, strike two.

We finally ended up at Trader Jack's, a well known restaurant and bar. Sandy and I had gone there last year and I even have a tshrit from them. Although it is right on the water, it was crowded enough that we ended up seated in the back. No view, but the pizza I had was really good, so that made up for it. And since I missed my waffles and ice cream, I came back to town on my own the next morning and had some. That also gave me a chance to check out every possible place in town for tshirts. For some reason, Sandy and Mary Beth didn't share my enthusiasm for that.

We didn't really do many other excursions from the resort. Last year Sandy and I tried a few and they weren't very exciting. One morning we did all go to breakfast at a place on the east side of the island. It gave Mary Beth a chance to see Muri Beach, one of the more famous spots on Rarotonga. It's very pretty but does have more tourists and more tourist-oriented activities. We just weren't interested in riding a boat out to a motu for a lunch of local foods and a polynesian dance show. We like the west side of the island better because it's a lot quieter.

Sandy and I did make another trip to the east side of the island later in the week. We stopped at the Rarotonga Sailing Club and had a beer in their bar. It has a beautiful view looking out at the lagoon and motus at Muri Beach. Afterwards we had a late lunch at Vili's Burger Joint, the most famous hamburger spot on the island. Sandy is our burger connoisseur and she rated it just "meh", so it probably won't be on our list the next time we go to Rarotonga. And that was about it for our excursions.

Most days were pretty similar. Sandy and I got up early every morning and walked a route that we discovered the year before. It went down the main road and then turned off to go up a good sized hill to the local hospital. From there, two trails lead further up into the hills and make a loop. We hiked to the highpoint last year and the trail was mostly in forest with no good viewpoints at all. It wasn't really worth the effort. But we thought the walk to the hospital was a good workout, so we did it every day. I measured it with my GPS and AllTrails app and it was 1.7 miles with 243 feet of elevation gain. It took us between 30 and 40 minutes. There were usually other people doing the walk, some locals and some tourists, and by the end of the week we were recognizing people and saying hi. Mary Beth didn't come along. She chose to sleep in rather than join us on our morning workout.

After our walk we would shower and then have breakfast at the restaurant at the resort. A simple buffet was included with our package and that's what I always did, just having a bowl of cereal and some fruit. Sandy and Mary Beth usually ordered big cooked breakfasts, but as I said before, I'm not a breakfast guy. Instead, after the restaurant I would go to the little bakery across the street. They had great swiss rolls and doughnuts so I would get something there every morning.

Then it was time to head for the beach. We spent most of our time there just relaxing - reading a book, admiring the ocean, or enjoying a drink during Happy Hour. We also usually did some snorkeling every day. Sandy and Mary Beth brought their masks and fins along. Sandy had a new prescription mask that I just got her for her birthday and she said it worked great. I had my mask but rented fins for a few days from Dive Rarotonga, a dive shop about half a mile down the road from the resort. Other days I just wore water shoes. The conditions were pretty mild and the water was warm.

There were lots of rocks in the lagoon to provide cover so we saw some colorful fish. Not as many as while diving on a reef but enough to make it worthwhile. A few that I recognized were triggerfish, butterflyfish, moorish idols, peacock flounders and tangs. There were also a lot of fish that I didn't recognize. We saw several blue starfish, something that I had never seen anywhere before. There was also a bizarre animal that looked like a colossal underwater caterpillar. They were virtually everywhere. I had no idea what they were. When I took my fins back to the dive shop, I asked the guy what they were. He said they were sea cucumbers. No, I told him I knew what sea cucumbers looked like, and had seen some while snorkeling. These were very different. He insisted they were sea cucumbers. Looking it up later, turns out he was right. They were a different species of sea cucumber than what I was familiar with.

It seemed like before we knew it our tine in the Cook Islands was almost over. On our last full day we went into town again to visit the Saturday public market. It was bigger than it had been the previous year and actually had a lot of interesting stuff. I got a tshirt (of course)and a Cook Islands cap, as well as a few things as gifts for folks back home. There were more people in town than I had ever seen before. Saturday was busy the year before because it was market day, but there was also a cruise ship in the harbor and lots of people had come off of it. The Cook Islands are a long way from anywhere and I had never seen a cruise ship there before. I talked to two Americans who had come off the ship. They said it started on the West Coast and had gone to Hawaii, Samoa and several other islands before coming to Rarotonga. The whole trip was 53 days. They had just retired and were doing it as their trip of a lifetime. I had to admit that it did visit an impressive number of places but I'm not sure I am sold on traveling on a big cruise ship, especially for that long. I would prefer to spend my 53 days of vacation actually on a tropical island rather than sailing for days across open ocean between them. To each their own though.

I can't say that I liked the idea of having a cruise ship stop in Rarotonga. Avarua was overrun with people that day. The busses were all packed and had to pass by people that they didn't have room to pick up. They had to add more buses later in the day to handle all of the extra people.

Nope. I prefer fewer people, more low key. Quieter is better. I sure hope that the cruise ship isn't the beginning of a trend.

And that was our time in Rarotonga. The next day we had to leave. We had enough time to do our morning walk, get cleaned up and still have breakfast before leaving for the airport. The new schedule for the flight home really worked much better. There were no problems checking in and soon we were flying to Hawaii, where we would spend two days in Honolulu. That would be a completely different experience.

We had all really enjoyed our time in the Cook Islands. It still feels, most of the time, like the remote South Pacific.