Destination Next: Is this South Pacific idyll the new Bali?

Done (or done with) Bali? This unspoiled tropical island takes less time to fly to from Australia's east coast and could well be the perfect alternative.

While it may have a distinctively different geography, history, culture and cuisine, I can imagine this is what Bali must have been like decades ago, sans shopping malls, traffic snarls and hard-sells.

I've arrived on Rarotonga in the Cook Islands the morning of the same day I left Australia, despite an overnight flight - a quirk of crossing the international date line. At the airport, I'm welcomed with an 'ei - a garland of sweet scented tiare maori flowers - and walk past an energetic ukulele player into a morning that envelops me like a warm hug. Within 10 minutes I'm in my hire car, heading down the Ara Tapu coastal road (speed limit max 50). It's still early and Te Rua Manga, "the needle", a rocky spire puncturing the greenery of the island's hilly spine, wears a mist crown that will burn off as the day heats up.

The road rings the island, travelling through tidy villages where modest beachside bungalows with billion-dollar views squat in luxuriant gardens, precision-trimmed lawns hedged by hibiscus, frangipani and heavily fruiting papaya trees.

I'm staying on a beach between the sleepy national capital, Avarua and the village of Muri. Owners of the four-star Ocean Escape Resort and Spa, Barry and Jade spent their honeymoon in Rarotonga and fell in love with the island, packing up their lives in Brisbane and returning to build these 12 mezzanine cabins. Adults-only and with a small footprint, it feels more retreat than resort. There's a spa (considered to be the best on the island), a bar and a saltwater pool with water drawn daily from the ocean and a living coral bloom at the deep end. Barry tells me that when the local turtle rescue organisation has one too big for their tanks, they ask him if they can put it temporarily in the pool.

"I just tell the guests, yes, of course you can use the pool, but you might have to share it with a turtle," he laughs. I secretly hope there's a turtle that needs rescuing during my stay, but I'm out of luck.

As it turns out, it's pretty easy to see turtles in their natural environment anyway. Drive 15 minutes to the south-west coast and you can strap on a snorkel and goggles, wade into the water and find yourself swimming alongside a turtle.

Rarotonga's beaches are almost surreally perfect - like a Hollywood South Pacific film set, with saturated hues of turquoise, silver and green, and coconut palms standing tall. Best of all, there are no big international hotels shadowing the sunbathers; no beach clubs with DJs, nor touts working the tourists.

The island is encircled by a reef creating a protected inner lagoon, and it's worth taking a cruise to the best snorkelling spots. There are a handful of operators, all with similar offerings, but I do a half-day cruise with Captain Tama, whose sun and sea-bronzed guides are trading well-practised banter with guests almost as soon as we've pulled anchor. We motor out and around a headland to the south-west and, once we moor and have received our safety briefing, don googles, snorkels and flippers and slide in. The water is astoundingly clear and a gentle current drifts us over bommies supporting anemones, soft corals and giant clams. Due to the protection afforded by the reef-ringed lagoon and its rich food sources, fish proliferate and it feels like rush hour as schools of blue damsels streak past and giant trevally zigzag through us at speed - like harried commuters rushing for the train.

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Afterwards we sail to one of the small lagoon islands for a barbecue while the multi-talented staff entertain us with a high-energy drumming and ukulele performance.

Rarotongan culinary style is all about freshness and generosity. With the warm climate and fertile, volcanic soil, the island grows most of its own fruit and vegetables. There are no rice paddies but fields of taro everywhere, the leaves like enormous elephant ears, as well as plantations of papaya, cassava and banana, and newer crops such as cocoa and vanilla.

Cacao farmer Framhein Koteka drives me around to show me the micro-plantations where his growers are tending the trees that bear heavy yellow pods. His chocolate "factory" where he ferments and processes the pods into a 100 per cent cocoa chocolate to sell at the Saturday markets is more "garden shed" then production line, but he has big ambitions for cacao growing on the island and his "pod to block" business.

Seafood is of course ubiquitous - super fresh and very well priced. Local speciality ike mata, diced raw fish marinated in lime, coconut milk and chili, is found on just about every restaurant menu, yet each version is subtly different. I try it served in a polished coconut bowl at the upmarket Tamarind House while overlooking a garden leading to the sea, at the Muri Sailing Club with its lagoon-side deck and at casual beach shack Charlie's, ultimately unable to pick a favourite.

Some of the island's best eating options are restaurants within resorts, their absolute-beachfront dining a drawcard even for non-guests. At the family-friendly Sandals Restaurant at the Pacific Resort - where, as a solo diner, I'm attempting not to draw attention to myself - I order fish which is delivered on a sizzling plate with great ceremony and huge clouds of steam, to much head swivelling and applause from other diners. At Nautilus, an expertly balanced curry attests to the island's close relationships with neighbours, the spices courtesy of the resort's Fijian-Indian chefs.

Operating four times a week are the Muri Night Markets, where fairy lights are strung above tables beneath the mango trees, and stalls and food trucks dish up everything from sticky pork ribs to barbecued prawns. Just make sure to bring your Cook Island or New Zealand dollars though, as it's strictly cash only.

The highlight of my Rarotonga food experiences, however, is a progressive dinner - entree, main and dessert served at a different local's home. It's a privilege to experience not just the "manakitanga" - the hospitality of the Cook Islanders - but to have a peek into their homes and lives.

Like Bali, the island inspires both homegrown and foreign artists. On an arts and culture tour, I meet sculptor Michel Kirsch and his wife Sylvie who settled here from central France 13 years ago.

"We were travelling around the South Pacific and finished our travels here and he just fell in love with the stone and the people," Sylvie translates for Michel. That fine basalt stone and island life totally changed the subject of Michel's sculptures, which now draw largely from nature.

"When we arrived, he had difficulty in doing personal work, so overwhelmed he was by the culture. He had to reinvent himself, to be open and learn from it. Through encounters with other artists and the life and spirit of the island he found inspiration and slowly was able to learn to walk again this artist's path," Sylvie says.

The arts and crafts tour also takes in the island's longest established craft factory, a place that makes many of the souvenirs found across the island. Owner Vaea Melvin takes us into the workshop, to watch the carving of drums and wooden deities. There are squat forms of Tangaroa, Rongo and Taringa Nui, some of the local gods banned by the missionaries. It was Vaea's husband's grandfather who started a renaissance, bringing back the carvings, only to be met in some quarters by condemnation and anger. "Some people bought the carvings just to burn them," she says.

We also visit a ukulele maker. The small stringed instrument is omnipresent in the Cook Islands, and we watch as "Socks" shows us how he cuts the basic shape with his lathe then fashions each by hand, before summoning his daughter to give us a rendition of the global ukulele standard Over the Rainbow.

There are plenty of small shops and galleries to see and buy traditional art, such as weaving and "tivaevae", the colourful and highly collectable quilts made by local women, but for an overarching view of South Pacific art, the Bergman Gallery, housed in a former mission-style Sunday school building that dates from the 1800s, is a good option. It has an ever changing Pan-Pacific exhibition, including work by local cultural icon Mike Tavioni (whose outdoor gallery/school you can also visit); a retro cafe and a shop selling Cook Island-made art and jewellery, including the famous glossy black pearls from the island of Manihiki.

There are only a few stragglers still coming home from church when I head out for a coffee on Sunday morning, the women wearing floral dresses and the distinctive palm-weave hats, known as "rito". Religion, brought here by missionaries two centuries ago, is very much part of the fabric of everyday life and I'm momentarily nonplussed the first time I eat with a local and am asked to say grace.

Services take place in one of the many lovely white stone churches and visitors are welcome should you wish to join them, but just as when visiting a Balinese temple, you're asked to dress and behave appropriately.

"Navigators relied entirely on their memory and senses to gauge the wave patterns learned from stick charts, to guide them," the museum sign reads. "They would crouch down or lay prone in the canoe to feel how it was being pitched and rolled by underlying swells."

Today, the Rarotongans seem to be just as skilful at navigating the delicate task of balancing the need for tourism with a deep respect for nature and an unwavering desire to preserve their own values. The result is a destination that is culturally rich, slow-paced and charmingly low-fi.

Getting there: Jetstar operates a direct service from Sydney to Rarotonga four times a week on Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday and Sunday. Fares are from $329 one-way.

Staying there: Ocean Escape Resort has double ocean view villas from $NZ499 ($461). oceanescaperesort.com

Getting around: A round-island bus operates in a clockwise and anti-clockwise direction from the centre of Avarua. Tickets cost $NZ5 per ride or $NZ20 for a day pass. There are two car rental companies at Rarotonga Airport. Polynesian Car Rental has cars from around $NZ425 for three days while Avis has cars from around $NZ123 per day. cookislandsbus.com; polynesianhire.co.ck; avis.com.au

What to do: Raro Tours run their private Arts and Crafts tour Monday to Friday for $NZ511 a couple including lunch. Cook Islands Tours Progressive Dinner Tour, $NZ115 a head ($NZ80 for kids) including hotel pick-up, operates on Mondays and Thursdays. Captain Tama's Barbecue Lagoon Cruise departs Sunday to Friday at 11am from Muri Lagoon, adults $NZ105, children $NZ49. Entry to the Te Ara Cultural Museum is $NZ15. rarotours.co.ck; cookislandstours.co.ck; www.captaintamas.com; tearacimce.com

Explore more: cookislands.travel

The writer was a guest of Cook Islands Tourism.