Rarotonga Adventure Part 4
So our last morning!

We started off getting our morning fill of weetabix in the dining area. I wanted to take a better picture of the place 'cos it was quite pretty with the sun shining in. Unfortunately, there was a huge scary guy sat in the middle there who I didn't really want to piss off so I took the picture from where I was sitting.

In hindsight, he probably wouldn't have beaten me up for taking a picture but y'know...better safe than sorry!



We headed back to the room after breakfast to get out stuff ready for the day. Unfortunately, the cleaning lady was just going in so we figured we'd go arse around by the pool while they were finishing up.

Good thing too. If we hadn't taken the time to hang around there, I never would have discovered that the showers came out of coconuts.



This pleased me greatly.



I was switching them on and off for a good 10 minutes. Like Homer Simpson with a light bulb. Thumbs up for the coconuts. Eventually Matt tore me away and we headed back to the room to get our stuff together.



We managed to miss the bus so we decided to do the trek into Avarua again. On the way, Matt videoed a whole bunch of abandoned buildings. I don't really know the history behind these I'm afraid. What a rubbish narrator. They were cool though. Matt's going to cut the shots into his apolcalyptic drama which he'll shoot one day. I assume he'll edit out the chickens that were wandering around though.



Once we were in Avarua, we went to the mighty Banana Court to grab some icy drinks. Which I then plastered to my face in a pathetic effort to cool down. Then it was on to Cafe Salsa to sample their excellent pizza. Which was excellent. I was in such high spirits that I decided to have some chocolate cake too. Which was also excellent but perhaps a mistake as I then spent a good hour wanting to vomit afterwards.

To cool down, we thought we'd cross the road and check out the canoe racing under the palm trees. The ad on TV had stated people come from all over to watch the races. And there were some obnoxious Americans at the hotel the night before, who talked about the rowing. So it would appear that it was the place to be.



I don't know if it's entirely clear from that picture but there was absolutely NOBODY there. And the canoes went out there on their own. They did not appear to be racing. First the Big Trampoline was overhyped..now this. We were starting to lose our trust in Cook Islands Television. We actually spent most of the time watching the kids jumping into the harbour and then I posed with coconuts for a bit.





For the record, the back of that coconut was rotting and it smelled rancid. Don't tell me that I don't suffer for my camera-whore-dom.

I stole the flowers in my hair from a bush on the walk into Avarua. There are flowers absolutely everywhere. And I thought it was just a tourism thing with all the women wearing flowers in their hair but they actually genuinely do! Little old ladies on the bus with daisies through their hair. It's lovely. They pulled it off a lot better than I did. In fact I had to lose them after a while. I was getting freaked out seeing the red flower looming out of the corner of my eye every 5 minutes. Plus I'm pretty sure bugs were following me. Otherwise though, I was a total local. Fully blending in.

After we'd had our fill of canoes, it was off back to Muri Lagoon again. This time in search of kayaks from the famous Captain Tama.



Oi fat lady, get outta my shot!



That's my "I'm getting in a kayak!" smug face.



Apparently when posing and looking out to sea, it is essential to have one foot in the air.



If you're wondering why this picture is black n white, it's because I was roughly the colour of a tomato and it was freaking me out. God bless you monochrome.

We ended up at Captain Tama's...uhh shed. Which had kayaks outside. Which seemed promising. We stood for ages outside saying very loudly "I don't think there's anyone here!" and "What should we do??" hoping someone would hear us. Nobody moved. Then two dudes pulled a couple of kayaks up out of the water and started showering. I asked one who he hired them from and he said "uhh...him" and pointed to a guy sat behind us. Who apparently had been sat there the whole time. I don't know what he thought we were doing! Anyway, he hooked us up. 5 bucks for a kayak for an hour. Not bad going and he even hung on to our bags while we were in the water. so a bit of a legend really. It's only now we're starting to wonder whether he actually owned the kayaks at all but oh well! It all worked out.

The next load of photos were taken with a disposable waterproof camera while we were out on the water - just as well I didn't take my proper camera out there as pretty much everything got soaked. Anyway, there's a pretty big drop in quality. So that's why they look a bit different.


































We had an absolutely amazing time out there. The water was beautiful and it was so quiet. You could navigate around all the little islands and to be quite honest, I could have spent all afternoon out there.

Unfortunately, as we were on our way back, the clouds that had been brewing over the sea finally blew in. And we had one heck of a tropical storm.






So if we weren't already soaked, then after that we pretty much were.

We dragged our kayaks up the beach and then tried to take shelter under some palm trees. Fortunately, the storms in Rarotonga are always extremely brief and with about 15 minutes we were back to this:




We then spent the rest of the afternoon swimming and hanging out by the lagoon. There was hardly anybody there and it was just really relaxing and peaceful. I even got over my fish fear and took to just wandering around up to my knees and standing still until something swam by. I was a regular David Attenborough by the end.

At one point a huge shoal of fish swam right past me. I just sort of stood there frozen to the spot. My fingers were working though so I managed to click the camera before they vanished.





I played Hide & Seek with this guy for ages too:



He kept dodging back into the seaweed every time I moved so it took ages to get a picture of him. He was very cute though and kept poking his nose out..or his snout? Do fish have snouts?

Anyway, here's a bunch more pictures I took down there:















As the clouds started to roll in again, we went up to a little bar on the beach there and had a coke with a cherry in it. Which seemed to be a good way of toasting a lovely holiday.



We also jumped at the chance to photograph a couple of chickens eating out of a coconut shell:



Well how often do you get to see something like that??

As we were about to leave, a little rainbow appeared through the clouds.





Goodbye Muri! We'll be back one day.

As the rain started to pour, we got up to the top of the road and hid out in MuriMart until Evening Clockwise showed up. He was the evening bus and Matt proclaimed him even grumpier than Anti-Clockwise.

Unfortunately he'd only take us as far as Avarua. So we had to walk back to Club Raro from there in the pouring rain. And it was getting dark. It wasn't cold, just a bit scary. The standard of driving by the average local (or tourist) is not the highest. Especially on Saturday night. So there was a bit of diving into bushes whenever headlights were visible.

Eventually we made it back though. And had a lovely shower and watched some Cook Islands ads for a bit. This was about 8pmish. The bus wasn't turning up to take us to the airport until 11.15pm so we decided to go prance around outside for an hour or so, seeing as though the rain had stopped.



There was a beautiful full moon. In the pictures it just looks totally unreal.





It looks like I'm standing in front of a picture or something. Crazzzzy.

So about 11.00pm we wandered out the front and found a couple of other people lurking with suitcases. Sure enough, the bus arrived within about 10 minutes and we were off to the airport. The driver was lovely and presented everyone with a necklace made of shells as we left him.

Then there was a 2 hour wait at Rarotonga airport. Which was pretty funny, the whole place was outside! There was no "ohh I'm going through the barrier, goodbyeee!". The departure lounge was picnic benches outside! Okay, so they were surrounded by a hedge but really. It made Heathrow look absolutely ridiculous.

A brief overhead speaker notice came on which stated that they'd run out of food for the flight, so we should probably get something to eat now if we're peckish (we were getting used to this sort of thing by now) and then the plane arrived.



I think we were all on board and ready to go by about 1.30am.

The flight felt really long. It was only 4 hours which by my normal standards, is nothing at all. But I was just absolutely exhausted and couldn't sleep. And I didn't have a watch, so couldn't even tell how long we had left to go. It was pretty rough. They did at least dim the lights though so I might have got a little bit of rest. I'm not sure.

4.30am rolled around and we started our descent. Auckland actually looked really beautiful. It was still dark and the city was all lit up, with the Sky Tower flashing away in the centre. It's very strange to feel a sense of 'coming home' in a country I wasn't born in. This might be the first time I've really felt it. The skyline was familar and I was all happy and fuzzy. It might be worth noting though, that at this point I'd had no sleep in nearly 24 hours and very little to eat so I'm not entirely sure my emotions can be completely trusted.

I decided to be a good girl and declare my Shell Necklace and our snorkelling gear at customs (you have to hand over any sports gear for inspection). I found it pretty interesting that EVERYONE on the flight was given a shell necklace, and I was the only one declaring anything. I probably won't bother next time though. The woman was a total cow and gave us grief for daring to have some sand on our snorkel masks. That's exactly what you need at 5 in the morning when you've had no sleep. She let us through in the end though. Snorkel Masks included.

And so comes the best bit. We now had to wait for our flight to Wellington. Which was at 11.30am. It was now 5.30am. That's SIX hours spent sat in Auckland Departure Lounge. With no frickin' sleep. I think I may have dropped off at one point when I wedged myself into a chair. But mostly it was spent sat, staring at the window watching the sky slowly get lighter. It was really, really rough. I was starting to feel quite ill by the end of it. I always get nauseous when I'm really tired.

Eventually we ended up on the flight down to Welly. And we had the same chirpy air stewardess banging on about being proud of the country, blah blah blah. I don't remember much of the flight, although there was a pretty great view of Mt Taranaki as we flew over it. It was only 45 minutes and eventually we were descending into Wellington. Which was the usual "OH MY GOD, WE'RE GOING TO DIE" type landing. I don't think I've ever landed in Wellington and not felt like I was going to die. The thing is, I'm usually too exhausted by that point to care. And that was pretty much the case this time too.

We didn't die though, so good onya Pacific Blue pilot!

So it was now about midday. We've made it to Wellington. We were back on solid ground. Now there was just the small matter of the 2 hour drive back to Palmerston North.

Boy was that fun! Neither of us had had any sleep. I went first and got us out of the city and past Pukerua Bay. By the time we hit Paraparaumu, my eyes were starting to get incredibly sore. So we stopped briefly to grab some food and switch drivers. The second I hit the passenger seat, I passed out. Tried to slap myself away to keep Matt with someone to talk to. He lasted about half an hour before he started to lose it so we had to switch again. And we went on like that all the way home. It was dumb and stupid and next time, we're getting a damn flight into Palmerston North.

But we made it home! About 3pmish. All cats accounted for. Penny had gone nuts in the house while we were away - she always does. She can't JUST feed the cats. I think she feels like she has to stick around to give them some conversation or something. Anyway, all our washing had been done and there was fresh milk in the fridge. So I could have a decent cup of tea. Wonderful.

And that was the end of the holiday really! At about 6pm, I sat down on the couch and then ended up unconscious for several hours. Travelling is quite the exhausting hobbie. But it was beautiful and amazing and I would encourage anybody thinking of heading out this way to consider dropping the Cook Islands a visit because it's a magical place.

Alright, jesus it's midnight. I've been writing this since about 8.30pm. Probably time for bed. Hope I didn't ramble too much and you all enjoyed the read!!