Lonely Planet™ · Thorn Tree Forum · 2020 |

# Cook Islands/Tahiti/Fiji Country forums / Pacific Islands & Papua New Guinea / Tahiti & French Polynesia
richebee 18:18 UTC 03 Sep 2007 | Hi, as part of a round the world trip I will hopefully be heading to the above around december time. How bad is the wet season, ie will it spoil the experience ? or are the bursts short or at night time ? Basically should I be looking at a different time of year ?I appreciate your advice ! Thanks Rich |
silvanocat 20:07 UTC 03 Sep 2007 | You won't be going to all three in December on a RTW, unless you spring for an extra RT ticket between the Cooks and Tahiti you will be visiting only one of the three (Air New Zealand no longer flies between the Cooks and Tahiti and will cease operations between the Cooks and Fiji in October). Here is a weather chart from the BBC for Tahiti. I haven't been there in December. I have heard reports of times of heavy, heavy rain for days (not necessarily in December) and of others who have visited during the off-season with lovely weather. I personally like to keep the odds in my favor. | 1
raro 03:48 UTC 04 Sep 2007 | It usually doesn't rain for days on end, I think the longest it ever rained in a row was three days. But it can rain for an hour or two each day from Nov to April. The main thing however is that it will be HUMID. If you don;t like humidity, stay in an air-con place if you can afford it, ot come at some other time, maybe May to Oct. And as silvano said, you won;t be able to hit all three places. The Cooks are actually pretty empty of tourists around Xmas/New Yrs, as most of the airline seats (from NZ) are taken up by CI'ers who live in NZ and return home in droves to visit relatives. Some restaurants even close down for a few weeks, as it is so slow for those three weeks or so. | 2
uktravelover 03:02 UTC 05 Sep 2007 | We were in the Cook Islands in December several years ago. We had the occasional shower, but most of the time it was lovely weather, slightly humid but not too bad. | 3
richebee 18:00 UTC 06 Sep 2007 | Hi all, thanks for the advice ! Have decided just to go for fiji and cookislands this time round. Have family in NZ so there will always be another time for tahiti and more. As for hitting all three - fiji, cooks and tahiti - we could do all on a RTW ticket but would mean keep returning to auckland in between. Apparently it was possible as had spare miles on RTW ticket and it was still good price (sta travel sorted it). as for the rain, just going to risk it as confined to this time of year due to wedding in NZ, seems that yasawas and mamanucas see less rain in Dec so may head there and hopefully do the island hopper in cooks and see rar, aitutaki and atiu. Off to finalise and book RTW ticket now,Africa in 14 days time ... nothing like leaving it to the last minute !! Cheers Rich | 4
raro 09:13 UTC 07 Sep 2007 | In the Cooks: I think the Aitutaki/Atiu flight or vice-versa is only once a week, so you'll have to plan around that if you want to hit all three islands on that triangle fare. ALSO---if you go to the Cooks between about Dec. 15 to about January 10 you will run into all the CI'ers living in NZ that will be flying up and back from AKL to RAR, and the flights from RAR to and from Atiu and Aitutaki may be full as well. I'd try to book all these flights as soon as you can. In Fiji: The Yasawas and Mamanucas are in the west, and get a little less rain all year 'round than the east coast of Viti Levu and the eastern islands. | 5
richebee 16:05 UTC 07 Sep 2007 | Thanks, will look into flights, arrive Rar on Jan 8th now so will def book cooks flights asap , thanks for advice ! | 6