The travel bubble is set to begin on May 17.
Those of us who complain our way through New Zealand’s cold winters will be turning cartwheels at the prospect of a Pacific Island holiday this year. Raro, it has been way too long. If you’re after a laid-back break with beautiful beaches, excellent food, and very little prospect of getting lost, it’s hard to go past the Cooks. Especially since it’s the only Pacific Island we’ll have a travel bubble with for the time being.
COOK ISLANDS TOURISM/Supplied
Aitutaki is a stereotypically stunning South Pacific paradise.
Australia hasn t felt so isolated from the rest of the world since the jet airliner was invented 70 years ago. But at least we have one thing in our favour: we re right next door to paradise. And while Australia has been congratulating itself for its management of COVID-19, rightly so to a large degree, island nations in the South Pacific have even better pandemic records.
Some neighbouring nations, such as the Cook Islands and Niue, have recorded zero COVID-19 cases while like Samoa, Vanuatu and the Solomons have recorded barely a handful, all in quarantine. Aside from this collective success, they all share in common an enormous dependence on tourism from big brothers Australia and New Zealand.