Cook Islands Travel Guide

Over some 2 million square kilometres in the Pacific Ocean, an area about the size of Western Europe, lie the 15 Cook Islands scattered in the centre of the Polynesian Triangle with Tonga and the Samoas to the west and the islands of French Polynesia to the east. The islands are divided into two groups: the Southern Cook Islands, and the Northern Cook Islands of coral atolls.

According to tradition, the first voyagers to arrive in the Cook Islands landed on Rarotonga (now the main island) around 800 AD. These people had set sail from French Polynesia. Captain Cook sighted the islands in the 1770s but surprisingly enough he did not discover Rarotonga. Instead, Rarotonga was discovered in 1789 by Captain William Bligh who named the islands the Hervey Islands. It was only half a century later in 1842 when a Russian cartographer was publishing a map of the Pacific Ocean that he renamed them the Cook Islands in honor of James Cook.

The islands became a British protectorate in 1888. By 1900, administrative control was transferred to New Zealand and in 1965 residents chose self-government in free association with New Zealand.

The remote Northern Group of islands comprise of six huge lagoons surrounded by tiny flat coral atolls. Manihiki, 750 miles north of Rarotonga, supports the largest population in the Northern Group with around 1000 people from a total population or around 19,000. Manihiki is the centre for black pearl farming. Black pearls are the Cook Islands’ leading export, ranking second only to tourism in their importance to the nation’s economy.

The Southern Group has about 90 percent of the total land area of the Cook Islands. They are mostly hilly and volcanic with a few coral atolls. Rarotonga, the main island with the capital city Avarua, is the largest island (6,719 hectares) and there are a few islands that are uninhabited and accessed by air only.

The Cook Islands have no high rise hotels. This is a place for travellers seeking more than the usual clichés associated with the South Seas. Your visit here will be a genuine South Pacific Island experience - there's simply no room for anything else.

The Cook Islands have some excellent diving, great hospitality and a very laid back, relaxing attitude.