Tourism takes Aitutaki

By
Maeva Carr
Photography By
Sean Scott

Kia Orana and warm greetings from a 50 shades darker and slightly burnt Maeva. The aftermath of an epic staff trip to amazing Aitutaki!

What a wonderful jam packed weekend we had in Aitutaki for our Christmas party, also celebrating team Tourisms incredible hard work throughout 2016. (I was fortunate to join the fun despite working here for a short time!)

We arrived on Friday evening and headed straight to Ootu beach for our first activity the Sunset Lagoon Cruise. This was a highlight of the trip for me as I’ve done the day cruise multiple times with Te Vaka but had never done the sunset one. The awesome friendly crew took us out to the stunning Motu (islet) One Foot Island. We anchored here for about 3 hours and swam into the glorious sunset in the deep waters of the lagoon just a couple of meters off the shore with music playing and great company. Once the sun set the Vaka had blue lights on either side of the boat allowing us to carry on swimming well past my bedtime. I would 100% recommend the Sunset Lagoon cruise, it is a lot of fun and perfect for any occasion - a birthday, a hens/stag do or just because! Day 1: so far so good!

On Saturday we jetted off on a speedboat to the private motu Maina; a privately owned islet that’s the furthest away from the other motus. We spent 8 hours on Maina doing what we do best - being absolute BEACH BUMS hence why most of us are now in the office with peeling faces, including me! Don’t forget to slip, slop, slap! We finished this perfect day with a perfect evening consisting of an island buffet and cocktails whist watching the sunset. Day 2: Perfection (I know big call! But it really was)

On Sunday morning we headed to Aitutaki Escape a gorgeous set of beachfront villas for a delicious breakfast and lounged by the pool - most of us hiding in the shade from being burnt the day before. We headed to the beach for the rest of the day for more swimming and beach bumming ending the day at our accommodation Reef Motel sitting together watching the sun go down! The best finish to an epic trip!  

Other activities that are popular in Aitutaki that we didn’t quite get round to doing are windsurfing, kayaking, Lagoon tours, diving, snorkeling or you can take a page out of our book and just lax out on the beach!

I’ve compiled a list of my top things to do in Aitutaki:

  • 1: Te Vake Cruise- Whether it’s the day tour or the sunset cruise this is a must when you are in Aitutaki! The crew really look after you and bring to life an informative fun cruise with yummy fresh food and of course spectacular views and lots of swimming/snorkeling. 

 

  • 2. Eat at Koru Café’ – this is one of my favourite Café’s in all of the Cook Islands and unfortunately the day we went to eat there this time it was closed!! :’( every other day we drove past it was open #heartbreak but if you’re in Aitutaki definitely pop in for a bite.

 

  • 3. Walk/relax or tan on the Aitutaki sandbars- the sandbars in Aitutaki are such a treat (especially because we don’t have them on Rarotonga!) they are so stunning giving great opportunity’s to walk far out with the lagoon on either side of you and perfect to get those stunning picturesque shots #forthegram

 

 

I hope this post inspires you to visit Aitutaki when you’re next in the Cook Islands whether it be for just the day tour or a few days. It really is in a league of it’s own. Thanks for reading! Maeva x