Hey everyone. Internet was expensive so i have saved up all my exciting news for now. The cook islands are absolutely beautiful, however we haven't had the best weather. There has been a lot of heavy downpoors which limits time spent lazing on the beach. I am also being eaten alive by mosquitos, the bites are so much worse than in thailand. I have about 40 from just 6 days.

On thursday night we went on a hostel group outing to a bar called the staircase to watch some traditional rarotongan dancing, which was really good. We also learnt about the drums and other musical instruments that they use for the show. Really good evening.

On saturday i went to the polynesian market, which was good. The main things on sale were cook islands clothing (sarongs and hawaian shirts), pearl jewelery, wooden crafty things and fresh fruit like coconuts and paw paws. I bought a T shirt. The quote was "send some more tourists, the last lot were delicious".

On the saturday evening, 7 of us went out for an all you can eat indian buffet, which was really nice, and then we bonded while playing drinking games, didn't get to bed until about 2.30.

Today i went snorkelling with a really nice dutch couple called erik and joleen. We just walked down the beach for about 20mins, left our stuff under a tree and went straight in the water, we saw so many fish. We were accompanied by a stray dog that had followed us all the way from the hostel, he even came in the water with us, just couldn't get rid of him.

Unfortunately jo picked up another cold on the flight so she has been fairly hostel bound all week. But we have been playing cards with some of the other back-packers. Jo has developed a love for poker which will be pretty dangerous when we get to vegas.

We have one more night here and then we fly back to auckland tomorrow night, then we spent 12 hours in auckland airport before flying for 12 hours to LA. So you might not here from me again for a few days.

Hope you are all well, love to you all xxxxxxxxxx