Rarotonga highlights

Rarotonga didn’t exactly welcome us in, when we arrived at 1.30 in the morning it was so hot my jeans immediately shrunk three sizes and started sweating. Once we were through customs and immigration it started to rain. The lighting in the airport carpark is minimal so Lee collected the wrong rental car (they just leave your car unlocked with the key under the mat on the driver’s side). My sister had called the day before to give me directions to our holiday house, but it was very dark and neither of us had slept any on the plane and it took us ages to find the right place.

Luckily for us, the owners of the holiday house were there to make sure we got in OK. They didn’t have to do that, but we sure appreciated it! Sleeping in Rarotonga when you have just come from a Wellington winter is a trial: factor in the humidity, the heat, the crowing of roosters, the chirping of geckos in your bedroom and the noise the torrential rain makes on the tin roof and it’s pretty restless. We got there in the end, though.

Catching up with my sister and her family was the highlight of the trip for sure, but we also ate at some fantastic restaurants. Here collected for your enjoyment.

By far the best meal on the island is at Stephano’s. It’s a tiny wee place run by an Italian couple and they take a maximum of 8 bookings per night, so you have to get in early. The menu is small, you have a couple of spagetti dishes or a couple of ravioli dishes plus a special, but the pasta is all fresh and handmade and the sauces are amazing. Really authentic and tasty. I had bolognese, just to find out what it was like. It was a revelation, full flavoured with the best parmesan I’ve ever had on top. Lee had a tangy tomato and garlic sauce with bacon in it on his spagetti, it was good too but we both preferred our own.

For dessert I had ice cream downed in dark rich chocolate sauce and Lee had the tiramisu. It was awesome. We would have gone back there but they were closed on Monday night. You must go there when you are next in Rarotonga. It’s just past Muri on the side of the road. Bookings, as I may have insinuated above, are essential.

We had a lot of cloudy weather in between the raining

Sails: the Sailing Club. Right on Muri lagoon is the sailing club, where anyone can just walk in and get trashed on the delicious cocktails. I mean, be seated for dinner. Lee and I walked there along the beach and were seated straight away. The food was really good, we had garlic bread that was pretty much garlic perfection. For mains Lee had some very nice fish and I had a seafood Ceasar salad, which was basically prawns and scallops with greens, Ceasar dressing and a hard boiled egg. It was awesome. We even split a three-kinds-of-chocolate cake.

The cocktail that you have to try there is called a Lynchberg lemonade. It was sweetish and lemony and so good. One of those ones that I sip and I go purry. My mojito wasn’t that good so I drank it real fast and ordered a Lynchberg. Nom. Then Lee and I walked home across the dark beach, where we couldn’t really see that much. But it was OK, it was an adventure!

We went back there for lunch on another day and had a really nice mocktail as well. Can’t remember what that was called. Nice place anyway.

Trader Jack’s. I might not need to recommend this, since it’s where everyone goes by default, but we didn’t go there last time and it was good. Last time we went to Raro was quite soon after a huge hurricane and Trader Jack’s had taken a lot of damage. We were determined to go there this time and made a booking for our last night on the island. We got there a bit early so we had mojitos on the deck, they were really good mojitos and stronger than they tasted.

For dinner we split some garlic bread, which was nice, and I had a meatlovers pizza and Lee had a seafood chowder served in a bread bowl dealy. He said it was really nice, although I wasn’t in the mood for dairy so I just tried scrappits of his fish and prawns. My pizza was really nice, loaded with meat, tasty barbeque sauce and with a good thin base. They have a proper woodfired pizza oven there, and you can get pizzas to takeaway. On the side I had a serving of seasonal vegetables stir fried with ginger and soy sauce and these were excellent. Really tasty and well cooked with a bit of crunch left in each piece.

Probably the best thing about Trader Jack’s was the service. There were a number of staff working and they were very attentive, checking back with us frequently and ensuring we had everything we needed. Most service on the island is friendly but slow, being at Trader Jack’s was a bit like being back in a New Zealand restaurant. Nice.

Look up, breathe in and relax

Other things we enjoyed: kayaking in the lagoon, shopping at Tokerau Jim (craved mother of pearl jewellery) and Vonnia’s (general store with cheap fabric), Saturday morning market (toffee apples, Belgian waffle with nutella, new handbag), creme brulee at Tamarind House, spotting geckos, trying to work out what the roosters were saying to each other and driving with the top down when it wasn’t raining.