A Taste of Paradise!!!!

It's beautiful here, since arriving 2 weeks ago it's been totally tropical!

We are staying in a beach hut 5 meters from the beach which is wonderful apart from the ant infestation!!! but we can live with that.

Apart from laying on the beach everyday working on our base tans, we have been snorkelling in the lagoons we saw some Parrot fish and Tuna as well as a rather large Octopus which Rob was very scared of and loads of Sea Cucumbers, which are horrible!!

We rented a car out last week with some friends we met to drive around the Island which is only 32km around the perimiter, after 5 times round we'd had enough so went and sat on the beach again.

We sampled a bit of the islands culture going to a traditional music and dancing evening with grass skirts and coconut bras and lots of shaking hips, Rob was loving it!! Last Sunday we went to the local Church service which was really nice, lots of singing the people are really friendly. After the service they invited us for lunch at the church hall where we had a buffet of local food and chatted to other tourists and the locals. We can't believe how nice people are we have been offered a place to stay all over New Zealand!!

We bicycled round the Island yesterday which left us rather tender in the bum cheek area but was a good laugh. We have been to the market this morning and bought some bananas and Rob is looking for some custard.

We fly to New Zealand on Monday morning which we are really excited for but will be sad to leave the Cook Islands because of the friends we have met who have made it really fun. We are not looking forward to the cold weather though apparently it's freezing!!

We have managed to put a few photos up but it's too slow so we will upload the rest in Auckland.

Both Mum's we will call you from NZ as it's really expensive here.

Sarh and Chris thanks for the advice it is paradise here.

Love to everybody, Miss you lots

Gem and Rob xx