Cook Islands: Ready, Steady, Cook
The bountiful Cook Islands are a taste of paradise. Providing, of course, you avoid Aitutaki’s plummeting coconuts and giant crabs. Neighbouring idyll Atiu is tiny. So small, in fact, that everyone remembers your name - and that’s depite the drinking rituals...
There’s only one rule on the beach,’ says Mr Tom. ‘Don’t sit under a coconut tree.’ I bear it in mind later that afternoon when I walk barefoot down to the shore from Mr Tom’s Cottage, carrying a glass of Pinot Noir and a feeling of goodwill after my first day on Aitutaki, one of the Cook Islands in the South Pacific. I walk away from the coconut palms that run like a fringe round the entire length of the island, and to the edge of the banana-shaped beach that crescents out on either side. The sand dazzles me. The sea is turquoise and the sky deep blue. I take a sip of the wine, which like most local produce is imported from New Zealand, and look for a spot in the shade where I can take in the moment and avoid plummeting coconuts.
That night at Ralphie’s, the main restaurant/bar/hang-out on Aitutaki, I start with eke taakari - curried octopus in coconut cream. Should I follow it with fresh tuna, wahoo or parrot-fish and chips? No, I’m in a curry mood so it’s curried goat with rice and banana, and a few glasses of the house red. I eat in Ralphie’s four times in my three days on Aitutaki, and every time the PA seems to be playing, ‘I Wanna Have Sex On The Beach’.
Next morning I think about death; not through too much wine, curry or, alas, sex on the beach, but because I have my breakfast at the Café Tupuna sitting at a table next to the grave of John D Harrington, Lt Col in the US Air Force. In the Cook Islands they bury the family’s loved ones prominently in the front garden or next to the house. John Harrington served on the island during WWII and then married a local girl, who now runs the café. What at first seemed macabre becomes moving - keeping thoughts of the person with you all the time instead of in some seldom-visited cemetery.
I fall into conversation with an elderly American guy who has moved to Aitutaki. He gives me his theory on travel: ‘Tourists go and expect everywhere to be like home. Travellers go and make anywhere their home. Aitutaki is for travellers. You’re here for three days? Not enough.’
So I try to make the most of it and set off to walk round the island, a feat which could be achieved in a few hours on the rough road that encircles it, if you didn’t keep getting distracted by beaches, wildlife and the sheer beauty of the place. There are white frangipani trees, red hibiscus, breadfruit trees, banana palms and mango trees as huge as English oaks.
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