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Published: October 20th 2010
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New Caledonia - Ile Des Pins & Noumea
We did a morning sail in to Ile Des Pins and went by the main Island and many smaller atolls. There are reefs everywhere so I can understand why they would want to sail the ship during daylight.
The sea is amazing in this area. We sail within 500’ of a reef with waves breaking on it and you look at the data on depth where the ship is and it is 2000 - 3000 feet deep. This whole area was formed volcanically so the ocean drops off very steeply from shore.
We arrived at the “Isle of Pines” at noon. It is a beautiful island about 25 miles in diameter with white sand beaches and turquoise water all around. Looks very inviting. It was named the Isle of Pines because of all the pine trees that were supposedly planted in the 1700 and 1800’s for use as masts.
When we got off the tenders at the dock, the first thing you see is the old prison. The French built it in the 1870’s, but only kept prisoners her for 10 years. I think I would commit criminal acts
Kids on the beach
They were having way to much fun if this was the place they would send me.
The sand was like powdered sugar and the water was calm and warm. Perfect place to have a nap to recuperate from our harrowing journey so far.
We spread out on a beautiful crescent beach and watched 6 or 7 local kids having a blast. They were really cute and everyone had to stop and take a picture of them. The water was heaven and even managed to do some snorkeling off a big rock that had thousands of beautiful fish swimming around.
At the far end of the beach was a beautiful resort. They had a sign up telling us not to trespass, but it was on the beach which is all public property. It must of been pretty exclusive, since they were not real interested in having any of us in there beachside bar. Some people even tried to enquire about rates and were basically told to go look at the website since no one knew. Quite a switch from being descended upon as we got of the ship to being given the cold shoulder.
One guest made the comment that it seemed the less
some people had, the more friendly and willing to share they were! As we travel around the more apparent this seems to be.
With that being said, I would really like to come back and see this island more if I ever get the chance. It has some of the most beautiful beaches and water I have ever seen.
We are now off to Noumea, the capital of New Caledonia (New Scotland by the way as Caledonia was the Latin name for Scotland) on the main island. We arrived 8 am in the morning and it was hot. It is Sunday, so unfortunately everything is closed. There are not even taxis out in front of the port. Really odd.
As we tried to find our way around we noticed this island is expensive. Beer is $7 for a glass. A burger is $10 - 14. Lunch at a decent restaurant would run $40+ just for the main course.
Noumea is probably the most developed city we have seen since leaving Honolulu. 5 or 6 Tower Cranes putting in new buildings. Lots of hotels and office buildings. This supposed to be the 4 th largest economy
in the SouthPacific behind, Australia, New Zealand and Hawaii. It is mainly due to the large nickel ore mines on the island. There is a huge loading facility just across the harbor from where we are docked.
We ended up taking a free shuttle (provided by Mcdonalds) to the Aquarium. It was pretty funny since we had to get a ticket. The same women was selling tickets for $10 each on the same shuttle. They love seeing us dumb tourists coming off the ship. We were the only ones on a 15 passenger bus that did not pay. And we could go to all the same stops.
The Aquarium was small but very nice. Some really nice live tank exhibits of native Fish, Corals and other sea animals. While wandering through, I noticed one exhibit that said that New Caledonia had the third most diverse native species in the world. All on an Island about 300 miles long. The Island and New Zealand broke off from Australia millions of years ago stranding plants and animals on remote islands. This allowed them to evolve on there own with out human or other predators for a long time.
New
Caledonia would be a very cool place to come back to in order to hike and camp and see the diversity it has to offer. There are trails and camping facilities all around the interior of the Island. Something to add to the bucket list.
That night we were treated to a performance by a local dance group. They danced and sang traditional music. It was very enjoyable. So we sail off not towards New Zealand, Nicole and Chris (Nicoles Kiwi Boyfriend). We have two days at sea then two stops in NZ till we get to Auckland on the 22nd.
By for now and we will update everyone when we get to NZ.
Bruce and Dianne
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larry
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thanks for sending
very interesting and beautiful place. i really did not know much about this part of the world. larry