Thoughts on Island Time

It's the highly anticipated end of trip reflection that all three of you will read. The flight back to LA was uneventful and quick. I slept for an unprecedented 6 hours. My adjustment to Pacific time was almost immediate, but there's certainly a difference between life in LA and life on the Cook Islands.

This trip was different in the sense that we didn't have anything planned. There were no trains to catch, no sights to see or places of historical significance. It's an island and there are beaches with blue water. The #1"sight" on the Cook Islands listed on Tripadvisor is a church.

The first thing that struck me about these islands is how isolated they are. When I think of other obscure pacific islands like Rapa Nui or Molokai, the Cook Islands are still more isolated. When offered the newspaper at breakfast, I found the top news story to be about the pros and cons of fishing with nets. Following this was a recap of a local rugby game and a single comic strip in the back so you can keep up on Hagar the Horrible. If you wanted to know what was happening in Australia or the Americas, good luck. Something has to contribute to this isolation, though, so let's try and figure this out.

There are currently only two airlines that connect the outside world to the islands - Virgin Australia and Air New Zealand. Of these, there is only one flight from the entire United States . . . per week. A quick statistics search yielded that approx. 120,000 people visit the Cook Islands annually. For some perspective, that's less than the number of people staying on the Las Vegas strip on any given night. Of that number, less than 20,000 visit Aitutaki, the second most popular island after Rarotonga. Those numbers are extremely low. That's about 55 people per day if you do the math.

It is also interesting what we observed about other tourists. There are virtually no Americans - almost all are from New Zealand or Australia. On Rarotonga, we were the only people renting a car at our bungalow. Apparently everyone else just gets an airport transfer to their bungalow and don't move for the rest of their vacation. I'm not sure how this is possible. I can't imagine not being able to explore the remainder of the island (as small as it may be). The car gave us access to spots to watch the sunset, the island's only waterfall, hikes, places to shop, and the option of going to different places to eat. I had no idea it was going to be so hard to find food. Most of the restaurants were simple tin-roofed establishments off dirt roads that wouldn't resemble an establishment worthy of visiting in the U.S. This is typical. Some speculate that it is due to the possibility of cyclones destroying buildings. If one's establishment gets destroyed and it was only made of crappy materials and corrugated tin, it's easily replaced. The same was true for store fronts. Looking for that ukulele store you saw a sign for? It's down a dirt driveway in the backyard of someone's house. Looking for that brewery? It's in that garage. Yes, the whole brewery.

Of course, all of this relative obscurity and isolation gives these islands something unique. For one, it's nice for picture taking. Beaches are empty. The waters are clear and pollution-free. But beyond that, the Cook Islands has preserved its culture and language. While almost everyone speaks english, they also speak a Cook Island Maori dialect. The same cannot be said for Hawaii. The Hawaiian language is all but dead. And the droves of tourists are reshaping what Hawaii was to what people think Hawaii should be with Mai Tais and ham & pineapple pizza being ordered instead of Loco Moco and mac salad.

The Cook Islands are still true to themselves. "There are no tomatoes on the island," and "Our store ran out of water," were things we heard during our stay. I don't imagine this would be said on Hawai'i. So to some, it may seem as an inconvenience, a departure from the comforts of home. You can go on a vacation at an all-inclusive resort and eat resort food and do resort activities and hang out with resort people or you can go on vacation and experience a place as it is, even if there are no more tomatoes. After all, I live less than a mile from the beach. If all we needed was a beach, we didn't have to go far. And in the end, Nicole just wanted to go to someplace that nobody she knew had been to before. Mission Accomplished.