Avarua

Yesterday was Jane’s birthday and our travel agent, Audley, must have told the hotel for late in the afternoon they came along with a card and bottle of champagne which was much appreciated and this sentiment was carried on into the evening. We walked out to a nice restaurant near us called Little Polynesian for dinner which our hotel had booked for us and for dessert they had piped Happy Birthday Jane around the plate. A nice touch. We were both quite tired through jet lag so were early to bed.
Due to jet lag we were awake early this morning and it was lovely sitting outside watching the sea and the sun rising but it was a bit overcast and we had a heavy rain shower. After breakfast we decided to make use of the e-bikes which are available for guests to use. These are great for pedalling is no where near as hard as a normal bike. We set off anti clockwise round the island. There is one major (!) road around the island which follows the coast. There is a bus service which uses this road and you take either the clockwise route or the anti-clockwise route - pretty straightforward! So we set off and gradually the weather improved, the sun came out and it was lovely. The road is very flat, there’s not a huge amount of traffic and we finished up cycling around the entire island a total of 32 kilometres and saw a lot of this beautiful island at a very leisurely pace. A few photos are attached of some of the sights we saw.
Rarotonga is a beautiful island with friendly people and is very safe. The only danger we were warned about is not to stand beneath a palm tree lest a coconut falls on you! The island is surrounded by a coral reef so between the land and the reef is a lagoon with the clearest of water and fabulous colour blue lapping on to white sandy beaches.
After lunch we took advantage of the snorkelling equipment that the hotel has for guests to use. This was excellent for within the lagoon are lumps of coral which attract many wonderfully coloured fish. Marvellous.
Our hotel is not really a hotel in the normal sense but a collection of a dozen or so villas some including ours on the sea front and others within the gardens. It is owned by a NZ couple who bought the property two years ago and have spent a lot of money on it upgrading the facilities . Day to day management is carried out by a couple from Hamburg, Tim and Lucile, who have been on the island for over 8 years and love it.Read more