Quirky facts about the Cook Islands

Quirky facts

about the Cook Islands

By Chris Taylor

It’s official, the Cook Islands have taken out top billing as the number one country in the world to visit on the prestigious Lonely Planet’s 2022 Best in Travel list. Although, this will probably come as no surprise to anyone who has already visited the sensationally stunning archipelago.

You may have heard that so far Rarotonga does not have a single traffic light and no buildings higher than the tallest coconut tree. Or that the 15 Cook Islands land mass of just 240 sq kms is spread out over an area roughly the size of Mexico. But here are a few more quirky facts to ponder on while you further explore this must-see paradise on holiday.

With covid lockdowns impacting most of the world’s cities over the past two years, you wouldn’t be blamed for dreaming of running off to a deserted island to get away from it all. In the 1950’s an adventurous Kiwi sailor, Tom Neale, did just that, calling the uninhabited coral atoll Suwarrow, home off and on for 16 years. Around 930 kilometres northwest of Rarotonga, he was totally dependent on the land and sea for survival. Tom documented his adventures in his best-selling book An Island to Oneself. What made him want to live as a self-imposed castaway before a global pandemic? Tom said of the life-changing hermit experience, “I choose to live in the Pacific Islands because life there moves at the sort of pace which you feel God must have had in mind originally, when He made the sun to keep us warm and provided the fruits of the earth for the taking.”

The current population of Suwarrow has since doubled from one to two, along with the hundreds of seasonal migratory birds that arrive each year to breed on its shores. A caretaker husband and wife team look after the designated national park and check on any visiting yachties. It was described by a passing Mrs Robert Louis Stevenson in the late 1800’s as “the most romantic island in the world”, seven years after her husband wrote the classic adventure novel Treasure Island.

However, if you’ve just landed on Rarotonga and are already mesmerised by the fragrant smell of tropical flowers and alluring sights and sounds of the Cook Islands most cosmopolitan island, be sure to drop by the Banana Court in Avarua.

The Cook Islands first hotel, it’s now a popular drinking hole with some interesting backstories, including a very famous regular. While filming prisoner

Banana Court

of war film Merry Christmas Mr Lawrence on Rarotonga in 1982, David Bowie often hung out and gave impromptu performances at the bar.

Before he jetted away, the understated rock-star actor told a local reporter, “I really love the place and hope that I get into other movie roles to be filmed here. I have found the people casual and friendly, easy to talk to, they’ve been wonderful.”

Directly across from Banana Court, you will no doubt notice the remnants of a rusting shipwreck sticking out of the lagoon. Although well known as simply ‘the boiler’, it was in fact the S.S. Maitai’s engine block. The ship hit the reef in 1916 with a load of Model-T Ford cars being delivered from San Francisco to Wellington, NZ.

Amazingly the vessel saved the island from a German patrol boat in strife, landing the following year., fooling the captain at night into thinking that it was a moored naval ship in blackout. The now sunken wreck is spread out over a large area and has become part of the reef. Ford tyres and bottles from the vessel can still be found by divers.

From the bright blue lagoon to the lush green jungle-clad craggy mountains, there’s lots to explore and discover. Te Rua Manga, aka The Needle, is one of Rarotonga’s most majestic and recognisable landmarks.

The breathtaking summit can be spotted from several locations on the island and is a favourite for those who enjoy a good climb. The rocky pinnacle was internationally recognised by the Dalai Lama himself when he blessed it as one of the eight energy centres of the world in 2000. Thanks to the guidance of crossisland trek icon Pa Teuruaa, when some Buddhist followers were looking for a special place to bury an urn containing the 900-year-old ashes of a monk.

Fact: Rarotonga is nicknamed The Rock.

If you’re also passing the grounds of the white-washed Cook Islands Christian Church in Avarua, you may stop to read some of the many gravestones. One oddly bears the army service in the American Civil War of one Charles Wells Banks.

It just so happens the Union veteran was also an infamous 1800’s San Francisco crook who’d absconded to the South Seas with a large sum of cash from his Wells Fargo Bank employer – winding up a fugitive on Rarotonga. Legend has it the 46-yearold married payroll clerk, had fallen in love with a beautiful young Cook Islands princess from Atiu.

Also hidden amongst the older headstones is the grave of well-known American author Robert Dean Frisbie. The travel writer ended up in the Pacific after serving in the First World War. Frisbie’s doctor had warned him his health was so bad that he would not survive another American

S.S. Maitai wrecked on Rarotonga’s reef The boiler Te Rua Manga aka The Needle

Pa Teuruaa

Cook Islands Christian Church

Avarua

winter. Instinctively he took off to explore the South Seas, including a short stint living on Suwarrow – inspiring his book Island of Desire. Incidentally, Tom Neale had earlier met the intrepid author on Rarotonga and was influenced by Frisbie to live on the isolated atoll long-term.

A short 45-minute flight from Rarotonga, Aitutaki is arguably the jewel in the crown of the Cook Islands. Few destinations offer the bedazzling spectacle that this paradise does on final approach.

It was nominated the ‘world’s most beautiful island’ by Lonely Planet founder Tony Wheeler in 2010 and was once a setting for reality TV show Survivor.

But did you also know that Captain Bligh discovered the island just 18 days before the infamous Mutiny on the Bounty? Albeit freakishly by accident in a storm. He traded with brave warriors who showed no apprehension of the alien vessel, and made a map of “Wytootackee” in his journal – before soon after being set adrift by his nemesis Fletcher Christian.

Fact: Aitutaki is also traditionally known as Ara’ura. There are 15 motu (islets) within its protected lagoon.

In more recent times, the Cook Islands have had their share of famous visitors that have fallen in love with the heaven on earth destination. From the Queen gracing its shores for an official visit in 1974 to open the Rarotonga International Airport, to Hilary Clinton, who created a big-name buzz in her capacity as Untied States Secretary of State at the Pacific Islands Forum ten years ago. Former NZ Labour prime minister David Lange used to brag that Aitutaki was the most picturesque place on earth, and flew there whenever he could. Fellow populist PM Jacinda Ardern has since followed suit, taking a not-so-secret family holiday there a few years ago.

Hollywood heavyweights Marlon Brando, John Wayne, and Cary Grant were just three silver screen legends on a long list of celebrities that travelled on the Coral Route that passed through Aitutaki in the 1950’s, while their aircraft refuelled beside the vivid turquoise waters at Akaiami motu. Those that remember this heyday, say the romance of travel died when the Tasman Empire Airways Ltd (Teal) wound up their 2.5-day island-hopping service connecting Auckland, NZ with Tahiti via Samoa, Fiji and Aitutaki in 1960.

Fact: The luxurious Short Solvent flying boats carried 34 privileged passengers. Tickets were the equivalent to a third of an annual salary. Passengers swam in Aitutaki lagoon while a chef would cook a silver service meal.

More film stars and formidable aircraft also visited this idyllic setting, but in turbulent times during WWII. A costly 4.5m crushed coral runway was first built by military personnel on Amuri field with a United States

Aitutaki’s spectacular lagoon

Fletcher Christian and the mutineers sent Lieutenant William Bligh and 18 others adrift. Eighteen days earlier the captain had discovered Aitutaki. 1790 painting by Robert Dodd.

Liberator bomber first touching down in 1942. Aitutaki’s pre-war population of around 2,000 then swelled by a further 800 US soldiers who were posted there in the pushback of the Japanese in the Pacific. Jetting in to entertain the troops was legendary actor Gary Cooper, along with starlets Una Merkel and Phyllis Brooks. First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt even made a brief appearance on Aitutaki to encourage the men in 1943 as they pushed north.

Loving the lifestyle on Aitutaki, a few GI’s later stayed on and married local women. They weren’t the first to fall in love with beautiful local vaine and succumb to the relaxed isles.

Have you heard the yarn about the Pommy gent who populated a tiny Pacific Island? It’s quite a story. Running off to the California gold rush from the UK in the mid 1800’s, William Marsters eventually found himself in the South Pacific and applied to the Queen for the lease to Palmerston Island.

He arrived on the uninhabited coral atoll with three wives in tow, including a chief’s daughter from Penrhyn in Cook Islands Northern Group. Just before the turn of the century he passed away aged 78, survived by 17 children and 54 grandchildren.

Before Marsters died he divided the land so that each of his three wives and their offspring had a share of the main island and each of the atolls.

Around 60 of his descendants still live on Palmerston, with hundreds more in Rarotonga, Australia, New Zealand and around the world. Believe it or not…one oddity that remains thanks to Marsters, Palmerston locals speak English in a Pacific Island version of a Gloucestershire accent!

Fact: Marsters built his home with timber scavenged from a shipwreck and driftwood found on the shore at the time of his landing. It still stands over 150 years later in its original state.

Upon spotting a picture hanging on the wall of Marsters home in 1972, the late Duke of Edinburgh, Prince Philip accompanied by Lord Louis Mountbatten, took a step back and exclaimed, “this is our lost sheep!” The party had been visiting on the Queen’s Royal Yacht Britannia.

And, although this may have just been a throwaway comment thanks to the Duke’s accustomed wit, the Marsters family have since discovered his mother was distantly related to the royals.

One of Marsters sons was invited to the Queen’s 1953 coronation but due to him being very elderly his grandson took his place. After travelling thousands of miles, he was denied entry after they’d overlooked advising the palace of the change of attendance.

Fact: After Prince Phillip swam in a Palmerston rock pool locals thereafter called it ‘the Dukes Pool’. When he passed away in April 2021 everyone on the island spent the day indoors as a mark of respect. The Union Flag and the Royal Navy Ensign were also flown at half-mast.

Back on Suwarrow Atoll, oddly Neale wasn’t the only person with his eye on the pristine spec years later. Being Crown Land, the Queen is the current official owner of the island.

Suwarrow was inhabited by Polynesians during prehistory, but it was uninhabited when discovered by Russian sailors in 1814. In a bizarre twist, a Russian monarchist politician and activist claimed he’d bought Suwarrow from the Cook Islands prime minister in 2011. Anton Bakov had

William Marsters

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reportedly told a Russian newspaper he’d paid millions of dollars for it to become the capital of a revived Russian empire. Turns out he was talking ‘nēneva’ – meaning insanely crazy in Cook Islands Māori.

Fact: Suwarrow was named after the Russian ship Suvorov that followed birds to the atoll.

Lastly, but certainly not the least quirky fact - even though Captain James Cook was bestowed the grand honour of the country being named after him 50 years since he cruised the Pacific in search of a great southern landmass in the 1770’s - here’s the thing… The famous English navigator never actually spotted Rarotonga, recorded just five of the 15 islands, and only personally set foot on Palmerston Atoll.

Cook first came across Manuae Atoll which he named Hervey Island in honour of a British Lord of the admiralty. Over time the entire Southern Group became known as the Hervey Islands. Until a Russian mapmaker, and evidently a Cook fan, Adam Johann von Krusenstern, called them Cook Islands in honour of the famous captain in his 1823 Pacific Ocean atlas. Spanish navigator Alvaro de Mendana was the first European to reach the islands nearly two hundred years prior to Cook in 1595.

Making international headlines in recent years, Cook Islanders have called for a name change to better reflect their true Polynesian nature.

Avaiki Nui has long been used as a local name for the islands and was a front runner for the potential change, so affording a link to their ancestral and spiritual homeland Hawaiki.

To be continued… Part Two Quirky Facts in the next issue of Escape - Magazine of the Cook Islands