Pitufa.at » Photo Galleries » Eastwards, Part 3: Rarotonga (Cook Islands)

The last stop on our passage eastward was Rarotonga, the main island of the Cook Islands. The island has a fringing reef, but the narrow lagoon is too shallow for sailboats. We stayed 1 week in Avatiu harbour.

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1/35: Time to reef?
2/35: Lopsided life on a heeling boat.
3/35: Wedged in.
4/35: Rarotonga ahead!
5/35: Avatiu harbour is rolly, uncomfortable, and on top of that expensive.
6/35: Tricky manoeuvre in the tiny harbour.
7/35: Our friends on Tidoudou arrive without engine with the help of the pilot boat.
8/35: Houses and gardens in Rarotonga are neat and tidy.
9/35: Everything's colourful in the shops.
10/35: Made in Rarotonga!
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12/35: Tourists are the main source of income and lots of them fly in from New Zealand.
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15/35: Hitchhiking is easy and we got a ride on the back of a truck with those two.
16/35: On the Southeastside a tiny lagoon attracts tourists.
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24/35: We walked up the cross-island-track to the Needle.
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27/35: On the way to Tahiti the weather got rough again.
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30/35: Rather at the beginning of this leg we had to cut away half a meter of this sheet as the clew chafed through it.
31/35: We discovered a crack in the boom next to an old repair and riveted a few metal plates on top as reinforcements.
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33/35: Soon after the genoa sheet ripped through.
34/35: The elderly gennaker continued the series of bad luck and ripped all the way through.
35/35: Racing northwards to Tahiti in easterly trade winds.