Tag Archives: New caledonia

A few days in New Caledonia.

Its monday 20th May, i’ve spent the last 3 days touring around Noumea. Done the normal tourist attractions, museums, gardens, walks, aquarium, beaches,etc,etc. Its difficult to get up to the higher parts of the island as the local transport seems to be very unreliable, it may get you there but theres not a very good chance of seeing the bus again to take you back !! The only way would have been to rent a car and stayed over somewhere, it seems though that you need to book your accomodation well in advance, not because anywhere is full, its just that they don’t like short notice – far too much like hard work !! Looks like we will be heading off soon to the Loyalty Islands, a fantastic looking set of three islands to the north east of New Caledonia. Stunning golden beaches, lagoons and palm trees. Have to start the process of checking out soon which sometimes is easy, sometimes difficult or sometimes plainly peculiar. When we checked in here the boat owner had to go and see the customs, immigration and a few other people, sadly there was a strike on and a big parade with loud music was happening. It was all very jolly even though they were unhappy with working conditions and the cost of living. The lady in immigration didn’t really want to be seen working during the strike and kept a low profile, fortunatley Porac offered the cleaning lady a tour of the local brewery if she was able to help, she convenietly stamped our passports and we were in !! The customs guy had already checked in one boat that day and didn’t want to do another as he was ‘so f*cking busy’, he stormed off to join the strike. If we hadn’t had a visit to the boat by 2.30 p.m. that issue was dealt with, this is quite normal according to the local yachties. Last but not least was the quarantine issue, a nice french lady came onboard and took some onions and garlic from us and then dissapeared. Most of today spent cleaning the boat, sorting out some fuel issues, bit of washing, general clean and tidy, has to be done every so often !!

A day of Rest.

Had a nice day today chilling out on the beach. Popped down the coast from the marina to where the local beaches are. Ths other crew member Brian had read about a place you could go snorkelling which was a short taxi boat ride from the beach. We jumped on a local bus that took us 10 minutes around the shore to where a couple of local beaches were. We took the taxi boat to Duck Island, a very small island where you can snorkel over a small reef, the reef was only about 15 yards from the shore !! The island itself had a restaurant/bar and sun chairs/umbrellas, you could walk around the whole place in 5 minutes !! It wasn’t busy so we found ourselves a couple of chairs and stayed put for the day. I think you are supposed to pay for the use of them but nobody asked so we didn’t. It was very hot, cool breeze, nice crystal clear chilly water. You only had to swim a few yards out to start seeing the fish in all their wonderful colours, shame i didn’t have an underwater camera – might invest in one of those. Went out a couple of times and marvelled at the variety of fish and colours, turned around and something caught my eye – a turtle !! I was swimming with a green turtle, he was about two feet long i think and kept looking over his shoulder when i got near. Highlight of the day. Went back to the boat and cooked steak for the other folk. Off for a couple of beers in the bar near the marina to think about my new little friend the green turtle.  photo IMG_0447_zps1e8917ea.jpg