Lonely Planet™ · Thorn Tree Forum · 2020 |

# Raro South Part of Island? Country forums / Pacific Islands & Papua New Guinea / Cook Islands
morphicwool 18:18 UTC 03 Sep 2007 | Hello, we are going to Rarotonga for a honeymoon. Looking at accomm that is roughly in the middle of the south part of island (Sea Change). Can any one tell me what that part of the island is like? Is it busy, ie. heaps of shops/nightlife/crowded beach? (we want the opposite - a chilled out, close-to-nature, fairly insular honeymoon). Is Aitutaki more approriate for the sort of thing we're after? Any villas on Aitutaki with private pool AND on the beach? PS - what are motu's?? Thanks :) |
raro 03:55 UTC 04 Sep 2007 | The south part of the island is the quietest, no bars, but few restaurants as well. But no place on RAR could be described as busy in the sense you are talking about! I think Sea Change is a bit overpriced, and the places are VERY close to each other! Go for Sokala Villas instead. A motu is an islet. There are 4 on Rarotonga, in the lagoon at Muri Beach. Aitutaki has about 20, all around the east and south of the lagoon. i don;t think any place on AIT has private pools like at Sokala, etc. But Etu Moana is pretty nice, considered by many the best small place on AIT. | 1
stellabella1980 13:05 UTC 05 Sep 2007 | For your honeymoon i would definately recomment staying at the Southern tip of rarotong (Rarotonga Resort Hotel etc) there is no night life on raro but also i would recommend going to Autitaki for a couple of nights as raro gets a tad boring! I went there for 14 days on the mainland for a holiday with partner ...gorgeous placce...love the Takatumi Villas (beautfiul family owned boutique villa accom) snorkelling superb out the front of your villa and each villa has own hammock and opening on to the beacj Congratualtions you will love raro! | 2
lordbalfor 07:04 UTC 11 Sep 2007 | The south shore is my absolute favorite part of the island (I'm particularly partial to the area around the Palm Grove). Elliot (ie Raro) is right - the south shore is very quiet While the west coast and the Muri area have lots of hotels and resorts of various sizes (none, with exception of the Edgewater, really very large) the south shore is largely residential with most accomodations being vacation rental houses and beach bungalows. There is no town as such along this shore, just an occasional mom & pop type convenience store or small restaurant scattered about. You certainly will not find it busy or crowded by an stretch of the imagination. A "crowded" beach along this stretch of shore means that you don't have the beach (as far as you can see, both directions) entirely to yourself. If you see 2 people strolling 100 yards/meters up the beach in one direction and 3 or 4 people a quarter mile away in the other direction it's busy. You can compare this to Muri Beach where on a busy day you might see a dozen people - both directions, as far you can see (WHOA!!!!! now THAT'S a crowd!!!). Seriously though, all joking aside. It will NOT be crowded by any definition I can think of. Now, Aitutaki will make Raro seem like Coney Island Beach in August. If Raro beaches are quiet, Aitutaki beaches tend to be completely deserted. Regarding Motus - Elliot is right of course, motus are islets, but that doesn't tell the whole story. With the exception of the southernmost motu at Muri, all the Rarotonga motus and all the Aitutaki motus are very low-lying little sand-bar type islands, maybe 4 foot high and covered with palm trees. You know that picture you have in your mind of a tiny little low-lying tropical island? You know, the kind of place you always see in a cartoon with some forlorn castaway sitting up against a palm tree? That's a motu. These motus are typically pretty small - maybe 100 yards/meters across from the lagoon side to the ocean side. The lagoon side tends to have calm, clear water and white sand beaches while ocean side tends to be rocky and strewn with chunks of broken coral and rough water. I LOVE motus. They are the kind of place where you can wander around exploring (not that there is that much really to see) just imagining that you are Robinson Crusoe. They are lovely places - the very image of a little typical pardise. It is these motus (and lagoons on which the stand) that makes places like Raro so much more exotic-looking than say, Hawaii (which is pretty beautiful to start with). Anyway, that's my take. Ken | 3