Career Break Central

If you ever want to really mess with someone’s head, ask them to figure out dates when crossing the International Dateline. Somehow, our itinerary has us crossing it three times on our trip. The first time was when we flew into Fiji. We only saw about an hour of September 30th in Honolulu and arrived in Nadi at 7AM on October 1st. However, going to the Cook Islands, we crossed back and managed to see both October 6th and 7th twice! We flew out of Nadi on the afternoon of the 7th and arrived in Rarotonga on the evening of the 6th! Our third and last crossing of the dateline occurs when we lose another day flying to Auckland after leaving the Cook Islands.

When I booked our beach bungalow at Rarotonga Backpackers, I mistakenly requested October 7th and the owner, Rebecca, wisely emailed me back and pointed out my mistake. However, even she managed to get confused, because when we arrived at the airport in Rarotonga she had us down as arriving on the 7th and their shuttle bus was completely full. In true laidback island fashion, though, she just shrugged and said, “Oh well, we’ll get you all in somehow.” So our first experience in Rarotonga was playing a game of “Stuff the Bus” with 15 or so strangers and their luggage (thank goodness they were backpackers). Everyone good-naturedly got cozy and we somehow managed to jam about 18 people into a 12 passenger van. Luckily, the windows opened and Simon and I spent most of the 10 minute ride to the hostel hanging out the window breathing in the fragrant humid island breezes.

Once we reached our island home for the next two weeks, we were pleasantly surprised by our lovely little studio bungalow on stilts right on the beach.

From cook islands

Each morning we woke up to the most amazing white sand beach with incredibly blue waves lapping on the shore and each night we were treated to a stunning sunset as we ate our supper on the balcony and later fell asleep to the sound of the surf.

From cook islands

From cook islands

From cook islands

We kept pinching ourselves and wondering how we had gotten so lucky to find this place – and all for only $120NZ/night (~$95Cdn)!

Our first morning in the Cooks dawned bright and sunny and Simon and Alexa were in fine form, literally bouncing off the walls as they let loose after their long travel day the day before. By the time Claude got back from his morning run my nerves were frazzled and I desperately needed some “alone time.” He took one look at the murderous look in my eye and generously suggested that I go to the market in Avarua, the only town on Rarotonga, on my own while he hung out with the kids. Since we had no local currency, I ended up catching a ride into town with a friendly local (don’t worry, Mom, there’s virtually no violent crime on Rarotonga). He warned me that pretty much everything closed by 2PM on Saturday so I didn’t have any time to waste. After a visit to the ATM, I was ready to shop! I thoroughly enjoyed strolling through the sleepy streets of Avarua and window shopping without constant tugging on my sleeve and demands for attention. The Saturday market was a riot of colourful stalls selling local pareus (sarongs), floral head wreaths, fruits and vegetables and black pearls. The vendors here were very different from Fiji in that they let you browse undisturbed and were friendly but not aggressive. The air was heavy with the aroma of cooking food and I sampled some of the local cuisine while I watched a demonstration of island choral music and dancing. By the time I returned to my family, I was calm and content and rejuvenated and completely in love with the Cook Islands.

We spent our first week getting to know our laidback island paradise. To the kids’ delight, we rented a couple of scooters, the main mode of transportation on Rarotonga, and explored the entire island. Since there’s only one main road that runs around the entire island and it’s only 32km around, that took one afternoon. The rest of the time we relaxed on the beach, snorkeled and built sandcastles.

From cook islands

The snorkeling was fantastic and we saw giant clams, a moray eel, an octopus and thousands of tropical fish. We got to know our neighbours, two couples from Hamilton, New Zealand, when Claude built a bonfire on the beach and we invited them to join us. Roy was an avid fisherman who fished almost daily and shared his catches with us.

From cook islands

Tom was an amateur artist and he painted a beautiful watercolour of the island, which I bought from him as a souvenir.

On Sunday, Claude got his alone time while I took the kids to church to hear the famed choral singing of the Cook Islands. As we strolled down the road to the church we could already hear the melodic harmonies floating in the air. Just as we entered the churchyard, in the words of Jimmy Buffet, I blew out a flip-flop. Trying to look dignified, I limped into the church and sat down as quickly as possible. I quickly forgot my embarrassment, though, as I looked around at all the smiling faces, listened to the music and admired the ladies with their beautiful straw hats and handmade floral head wreaths. Instead of placing the choir at the front of the church, they were dispersed in groups throughout the congregation which created a surround sound effect. The music was so powerful that it reverberated through my body and made the hair on my arms stand up. Luckily the service was about 75% music, because the sermon was in the local Cook Islands dialect and I couldn’t understand a word. The kids patiently spent the hour long service with their heads in my lap and after the service I rewarded them by taking them to the church hall where a lunch was provided (good deal, huh). We sat with a lovely couple, Dawn and Brian, from Oamaru, New Zealand, who were fascinated by our story and invited us to come to visit them on their sheep farm in New Zealand (stay tuned for details).

For my birthday, Claude wrapped my gift, a certificate for an oceanside massage at the Rarotongan Resort, in palm leaves and the kids made a card out of sand and seashells.

From cook islands

From cook islands

After my massage, I returned to dinner on the beach and a spectacular sunset that just kept getting better.

From cook islands

I couldn’t think of a better way to spend my birthday.

Unfortunately, I was brought back to reality when I checked my email for the first time in two weeks and discovered that my Uncle Greg had passed away suddenly. The first email had been filtered out by my spam filter and I didn’t even get the message until two weeks after the funeral. For the first time, I really felt the distance between me and my loved ones and realized just how far away we were. The best I could do was belatedly call home and tell my family how sorry I was that I couldn’t be there. This only reinforced for me the importance of living every day to the fullest.

To see more of our Cook Island photos, visit our web album.

Tags: Cook Islands, Rarotonga, South Pacific, Travel

This entry was posted on Tuesday, November 21st, 2006 at 3:10 pm and is filed under South Pacific, Travel. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.