Hi everybody from the Cook Islands! This place is literally paradise! The palm trees and tropical beaches are straight out of Bounty advert. It all makes for a welcome change after the concrete sprawl of Los Angeles. The city of angels was really cool but its just too big to get around. We stayed in Santa Monica which was the next area along from Beverly Hills but it took us 2 hours on the bus just to get between the two places. Once in Beverly Hills, we checked out the sights of Rodeo Drive and sneaked a look in the Regent Beverly Wilshire a la Pretty Woman. Along from there I spotted the skyscraper from the Die Hard movie. It turns out that the building is not the Nakatomi Tower but the headquarters from 20th Century Fox!! No trip to LA would be complete without visiting the Hollywood sign which was a lot smaller than I thought it would be - or maybe it was just far away and I was too lazy to make the pilgrimage all the way up the hills to the foot of the sign! Anyhow, the Cook Islands are definitely the place to chill out, relax in the sun and do sweet nothing. The whole island is kind of in the dark ages a bit though which I guess is the nature of paradise. There is no mobile phone coverage and I have still to find a payphone - apparently I have to trek into the town centre to the telecoms office to make my calls! Eggs and water are a more valuable commodity than strawberry jam. Fresh milk does not exist on the island and everybody lives off cartons of UHT milk - very bizarre! Amy and I have checked into a poolside villa in the heart of the jungle. It sounds luxurious but its not. There are ants crawling around all over the place and I am sure there are more things living in the carpet. The resort's definition of en suite facilities is a toilet in one corner of the room with a separating wall - you can look over the wall from the bathroom and the natural acoustics of the villa give a beautiful surround sound effect from whatever is going on in the toilet - very romantic!! Anyhow, I had better return to extensive itinerary of sunbathing. I'm not able to load any photos on my website as I am relying on the worlds slowest internet connection on the island - all done with satellite connections which is impressive but the internet keeps crashing as it waits for the next satellite to orbit above us!! Hope everyone is well! Best wishes Paul