Rarotonga

Has anyone been for a holiday or know anything about Rarotonga?  DH and I are heading over there for 5 days shortly for a wedding, I have plenty of books sorted, sunblock and insect repellent and my togs, is there any other useful things I should know or should be taking? Thanks!!

Umm...
Don't sit under coconut trees lol
Town closes at midday on Saturdays
Nothing is open on Sundays
If you're planning on going to one of the local churches you need longish skirt/dress and a hat
If you're likely to need any kind of medication take it with you... it can be hard to come by
Muri beach is the best place to go snorkelling and there is a glass bottomed boat that does tours from there which are excellent
The markets are open every day except Sunday. Saturday is the best day to go to these.
Most of the larger hotels have a Island Night with dancers, firebreathers, drummers etc and a Umu (like a hangi) dinner.
If you want to go exploring there is bus that goes every half an hour or so around the island. Or you could hire a car or motorbike and do some exploring on your own.
Breadfruit chips are awesome. So are mango, pawpaw, guavas, and coconut.

Thats all I can think of off the top of my head. Have an amazing trip. I'm so jealous of both of you!

Queenbean thats true you can take a lot of food! We were nervous with our suitcase full of food (i even wrote out a list of everything that we had packed but they just let us straight in! We had sealed meat too (i think just hot dogs and ham) as well as those yummy fresh pasta packs and the pasta sauce! The supermarket over there is expensive so if you want to save some money on food definitely take some with you.. we mostly took breakfast food and a couple of dinners. We also took UHT milk (think thats what its called) and coffee, tea and sugar.

My DH got a very deep cut on his toe from the coral and had to go to the hospital there to get it stitched up (quite amusing in the ward with someone behind a curtain getting tended to as well) so i highly recommend reef shoes if your going snorkelling or swimming! And the hospital bill cost us $150 cos we had no insurance! It still hurts him a bit a year and a half later and he did it the first day there so he wouldnt go near the water hardly at all for the rest of the time (though we did buy reef shoes the next day).

Oh and we loved having a scooter to get around on, it was cheapish and meant we could go anywhere we wanted.. i just loved driving around
If you want to get your license to drive over there avoid Mondays because its so busy from everyone arriving Saturday night/Sunday/Monday (closed Sundays) and took us around 2 hours to get it done..

Love Rarotonga!! Have fun its so beautiful there!

Edited by Panda289

Yeah getting your scooter license is quite alot of fun.

Take food/snacks with you as it is really expense for that type of food. They let anything in, we saw a KFC box come off the plane!

We found the Circle Island tour good for getting our bearings and knowing where everything is

ha...we got ciguatera poisoning...ended up in hospital! Had insurance though so reimbursed for costs when we got back. (Southern cross travel insurance were excellent to deal with, was able to call them collect from the pay phone at the hospital).

Everyone was pretty nice to us! AMAZING hospitality...
.......ahh...aitutaki.........

would go back in a jiffy!!!!

Everyone's already covered everything but just wanted to say have a great time!!! So jealous, we had a realy lovely holiday there a couple of years ago. Def get your scooter licence and hire a scooter for a whizz around the island (doesn't take long to go right round the island, I think about 45 mins to get back to where you started!).

Enjoy!

Raro is such a beautiful place.

Make sure you get some reef shoes because some of the places, the reef comes right up to the waters edge.
Do the circle island tour...
The pub crawl tour is also quite a hoot..
Dont forget to put sunsreen on your bum and lower back. By bum I mean right up your leg including the crease. Lots of people get sunburnt there because they dont put their sunscreen on properly and spend hours face down enjoying the wonderful snorkeling there.

Have fun

Raro is awesome! Went there for our honeymoon.

The only things i can add to the list above is:

btwn the airport and town there is a little steak restraunt. Well worth it! You get a massive meal for like $10 and entertainment to!

If you happen to stay at the Edgewater they have an activities board and run different stuff everyday. If you have time the Scooter Safari is well worth it!

wow thanks so much everyone, that is all really useful stuff!  Ooh a spa I never even thought of that!! Yay I am so excited!!