Anyone here dived in Rarotonga?

[Heg]

Hi
Looking at trying to get a quick 5 day trip sorted so don't want to have to have lots of flights or drama getting to somewhere from Auckland. Have done Vanuatu twice and Niue and can't afford Tahiti so looking at Raro.
Anyone tell me what the diving is like please?
Thanks

 

[HBO MD]

HI,
Dived some years ago, and thought the diving was pretty poor and poorly organized. At that time was unimpressed with operators.

 

[James Bond boat entry]

Did my OW and AOW on two different trips, however, since diving in Niue and Tonga, I would say don't bother going out of your way to dive Raro, but I really did enjoy the island it's self!!

Try Tonga & go up to Vava'u, Vava'u Islands, Tonga, South Pacific

 

[TSandM]

We dove Rarotonga on our South Pacific trip in September/October. I liked the island and the people a lot, and liked the young British fellow who was our guide. We dove with Cook Island Divers, and we were the only two people on the boat. It was a RIB, and we ran quite a long ways along the shore to the site Ian wanted to dive.

It was a nice site for topography, with some swim-throughs in the coral at the beginning, and we saw a big moray and a couple of lionfish in them. But the rest of the dive was like much of what we did in the Society Islands . . . Lots of dead coral, lots of crown-of-thorns starfish, some reef fish, but nothing exciting until the end, when Ian found a Spanish dancer and we took a bunch of pictures of him.

Viz was good, we saw a few interesting things, but I wouldn't travel to Rarotonga for the diving based on the one dive we did (and the data from a bunch of other dives in the region).

Go to Rangiroa, instead.

 

[Tinytechie]

Raros a beautiful island... Though the diving isnt spectacular it is still nice.. I lived and worked there for a year.. 2007 actually.. what a wonderful place.. its well worth a visit

And if you're gonna dive, go with Pacific Divers... they're the best.. coming from a year's experience watching all the operations operate...

 

[scuba_katt]

Agree with Tinytechie - definitely use Pacific Divers. I spent 2 weeks on Rarotonga in October 2000, and did 4 dives a day with Chrissy from Pacific Divers. The coral was a bit tired but the marine life was stunning - eels, turtles, nudibranchs, sharks and many many tropical fish.

On my very first dive we heard noises underwater and surfaced to find a whale breaching about 50 metres from us!