Rarotonga, Cook Islands

After five stops in French Polynesia, we finally got a taste of a non-French tropical isle – Rarotonga, in the Cook Islands. The Cook Islands, though independent, have tight affiliation with New Zealand (and many Kiwi tourists). They speak Kiwi-accented English, and use New Zealand currency with a couple of interesting "original" coins (one of them's triangular!) added for good measure. No offense to Paris, but we rather like places not run by the French. They just... seem to work better and cost less.

As for little Rarotonga, there's hardly any “there” there – all the Cook Islands together total just only 240 sq km and 18,000 people; 12,000 of them are on Rarotonga.

Rarotonga itself is not exactly huge: it is but 31 km around. They have two buses that circle the island – the clockwise bus, and the anti-clockwise bus, taking about 50 minutes each for the circumnavigation.

We used this as an introduction to the island – most memorable was the custom of burying mama in the front yard (possible only if you actually own the land). Imagine trying to sell your New Hampshire condo with Grandma planted on the front lawn...

The bus was standing room only, which made photos difficult for anybody who wanted a picture of something on the "other" side (whichever side that happened to be) -- but really, there wasn't that much to photograph, and it made for lots of people to chat with on the bus - locals as well as tourists.

The bus driver took the opportunity for a little free enterprise, by allowing the visitors to pay US$3 for the bus instead of NZ$3.00 -- saving us the trouble of having to get local money, for a mere 35% surcharge.

Though tiny, Rarotonga has good infrastructure, the local people were delightful, and with English as the main language, it made it so much easier to figure things out. This was the first island on the trip that we would want to come back and do a longer vacation.

Return visit

Like many of the sites we stopped at en route to New Zealand, we also called at Rarotonga on the return trip (April 4th). This time the weather was near perfect (it was quite warm and equally humid before) -- so we took this opportunity to wander some of the back streets. No exciting discoveries, just a gentle wander through a gentle island.

Vava'u, Tonga

Vava'u introduced us to the third type of island structure in the South Pacific – uplifted limestone [the other two are volcanic, and coral atolls].

With uplifted limestone, you get steep cliffs with sea carving out caves and other interesting configurations. There's a long fjord-like passage to get to Port of Refuge Harbor – a hot spot for yachties to hang out in the winter.

Since it's summer right now, things were pretty quiet. We spent our time on shore strolling through the sleepy little town, soaking up the backwater South Seas ambiance. . With dozens of little islands and resorts, this is another place worth visiting again.

The dilapidated building (1st row below, 3rd over) was the "Vava'u Club", built as the German Club in 1875. The guide books suggest a bit seedy history going on to this day, but some of our fellow passengers observed that it had been gutted and was just a shell.

Here are a few more photos from "around town". Click on any of the thumbnails for a larger version.

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