Trip to New Caledonia

Letter No. 270

Dear all,

DECEMBER 2023 After a terrific family Christmas and a few relaxing days at home, Katie and I flew to New Caledonia on 30^th December. It was pretty much the first holiday we’ve had by ourselves for 25 years. Matthew had left the day before for three weeks in the Philippines and Vietnam, and Jessie was staying in Brisbane (on dog duty) following her trip to Thailand in December. New Caledonia is a province of France and is totally French-speaking. It’s only 2 hours from Brisbane, but not particularly well-known as a tourist destination, a bit like a mini-Fiji but with Australian prices. We arrived at the Hilton resort about 4pm in the afternoon. Our little apartment had a lovely verandah and a great view over the bay. After checking in we went for a walk along the beach and then had cocktails and tapas at a great bar watching the sunset.

The next day (New Years Eve) I went for an early morning run and then we went for a long walk on the promenade behind the beach around a series of pretty little bays to Baie de Citron. We stopped for coffee and the first of many delicious French patisserie. On the way back we stopped at the Aquarium des Lagons, which was apparently the No 1. Tourist attraction in Noumea. It was quite good but a bit smaller than we’d expected, so we spent the afternoon at the beach. That night was New Years Eve. We had a lovely dinner at the Stonebake Steak House, where we cooked our steaks on hot stones at our table. My steak was therefore perfectly cooked – well done. After dinner we had a wander around and went to a little bar for a while. There were quite a few utes driving around slowly with ridiculously big sound systems in the back, blaring reggae style music out over the beaches. We had heard that the main beach was the party place to be for NYE, and there were a lot of people there, but it wasn’t very hip-hopping. By 11pm we decided to call it a night; it was midnight in Fiji, so good enough.

JANUARY 2024 The next morning I went for a run and there were quite a few house parties still going. It was quite funny. We decided to spend the day at Le Meridian, which was the other main resort in Noumea. The resort itself was nicer than the Hilton, with a beautiful pool area and private beach, but the location was not as good as it was further away from everything, right at the end of the island. It was a draw for kite-surfers though; there must have been 35 or so brightly coloured canopies vigorously racing around the point every afternoon. It was here that we learned from the bar staff that all beaches in Noumea had been closed for nearly a year following a series of shark attacks, one in which an Australian kite-surfer had been killed. The government had spent all year installing shark nets and hunting sharks, and the beaches had only just re-opened. We’d had no idea when we’d booked the trip months earlier! Lucky for us that the beaches were open again. 

The next day we went to the New Caledonia’s No. 2 tourist attraction – the Tjibaou Cultural Centre. It was a 40-minute bus ride and we arrived at 10am. The centre gave a history of Noumea and was housed in an architecturally stunning building. There were three sections, but only two of them were open, and the café and gift shop were also both closed. We toured the open sections and learned a fair bit about New Caledonia’s heritage and environment, did a small walk through some botanical gardens, and made it back to the bus at 11:30am! We wandered around central Noumea for a little while, had lunch in Coconut Square, then went to the Musee de Noumea. It was only a big house but was packed with interesting information and posters about Noumea’s political history, nickel mining and activism in the 1960s.

The next day I went on an early morning dive trip while Katie spent the morning at Le Meridian pool. It was a 40-minute speed boat ride to the dive site in a tiny bumpy dingy with no room to scratch. On my very first dive I back rolled off the boat and found myself right over a black-tip reef shark. It was only about 1.5m long and they are not very dangerous. I actually saw four of them on that dive. A little while later we saw a much bigger shark – a grey reef shark, which was quite a lot bigger. I was a little concerned, so I lay on the sand at the bottom until it swam leisurely away. It was about 3m long and I doubt I could have wrapped my arms around it. The dive instructor didn’t seem too bothered but it got my heart racing!

We were back on the surface for about 45 minutes, then took a 15-minute boat ride to a lighthouse on a small rock in the sea. We dived over a large sunken fishing trawler and swam through the hull into the different rooms. The lighthouse definitely didn’t do its job! We got back to the shore about 1pm and I met Katie at the pool for the afternoon. That night we went to “Le Roof” for dinner. It is a fantastic French restaurant built at the end of a 100m-long pier. Underneath the pier there are lights shining down to the sea which attract the fish, and every table has a view over the balustrade. There were absolutely dozens of huge blue fin trevally in the water. The meal was extremely good quality and we loved watching the fish. The bill was equally fantastic.

The next day we took a 45-minute boat transfer to the tiny island of Ilot Maître, where we stayed at the Double Tree by Hilton. The resort is modelled on the Maldives, with over-water bungalows, or Pilotis, situated on a circular pier around the island. Each piloti has its own private steps leading directly into the sea. Our room was on the island (you had to book at least a year in advance to get an over water bungalow), but it didn’t really matter as it was less than 5m to the beach and only a 20m swim to the beautiful coral reef. We had three nights there and didn’t do much except snorkel, swim, sunbathe and walk around the island – a whole 20 minutes! One side (where we were) was very sheltered and the other was very windy, so attracted more kite surfers, who came over from the mainland every day. So colourful and great to watch. There were heaps of Hawksbill Turtles on the reef just in front of our room. We saw six different ones on one snorkel. It was so great watching them – we spent ages just drifting around seeing what they did.

We made some fun friends the first day – two girls in their 30s and one man travelling on his own. The five of us spent every evening chatting at the only bar. On Sunday 7^th January we took the ferry back to the mainland, a bus to the airport and flew back to Brisbane. It was a great and very relaxing break, with lots of stunning sunsets.

After a couple of weeks back at work we headed off again. This time Katie and I headed to Melbourne for a long weekend, primarily to attend the Australian Tennis Open. Katie had booked us an amazing place to stay -- the Martini Suite just one block from Flinders Street Station. It was a lovely art-deco building, and the furniture was entirely art deco style as well, so it felt like stepping back into another era. Of course, there were complementary Martinis on offer as welcome drinks, and we made good use of them. We went out to Ilaria Osteria, a lovely Italian restaurant for dinner on the first night where we sat up at the Kitchen Bar watching the staff prep the dishes. It was very cool. Afterwards we popped into a nearby wine bar for a quick drink on the way home. It turned out to be a piano bar and it was really jumping, with the pianist playing a heap of familiar tunes and the entire bar singing along.  We stayed until closing time and – we sang along too!

On Friday morning we went to the National Gallery of Melbourne. There was a huge room entirely lined with new tennis balls. You could bring along an old tennis ball of your own and exchange it for one of the balls in the display or just decorate one of the existing balls. We got there in time for the artist’s opening talk about the installation. After we’d wandered around the museum, we went back and there were already quite a few decorated tennis balls. It was pretty clever. I would have loved to see it at the end of the two weeks of tennis. We had lunch at the museum and then went to Federation Square to sit in deck chairs and watch the tennis on the big screen. It was a really fun atmosphere and a warm sunny afternoon. After a quick change we caught the train out to South Yarra (just four stops) to see our friends who used to live in Hong Kong, Ian Whitton and Liz Redfern. We went round to their lovely house first where Katie and Lizzie enjoyed an excited catch up over glasses of bubbles before heading to the local village for dinner. We had dinner at a lovely up-market Chinese restaurant and then drinks at a nearby pub. It was so fantastic to catchup with them after a very long time!

Next day it was time for tennis with our friends Leona Terry and Jeremy Tod who had come down the previous night. We met them for breakfast at the famous Brunetti’s Patisserie both days and then walked to the tennis centre. The first day we were in Rod Laver Arena and the second day we were in Margaret Court Arena, in fabulous seats on the third row. We saw some terrific tennis on both days, featuring Carlos Alcaraz, Aryna Sabalenka, Jannick Sinner, and Qinwen Zheng, all of whom did very well. We also stopped in at the Piper Heidsieck zone, had great food and a lot of fun with the Tods. We went to Il Bacaro for dinner on the Saturday night, another highly recommended Italian restaurant with an extraordinarily expensive wine list.

On Monday our flight left in the afternoon, so we spent the morning at The Lume. It’s an grat digital art gallery located at the Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre which provides an immersive art experience. It was an enormous warehouse type space with art projected onto every possible wall and floor and odd shaped walls in the middle of the space. The exhibition focused on indigenous art and was very impressive. We lay on a couple of bean bags and watched the show through twice and then ate lunch at the café inside, watching it a third time.

We proudly celebrated Australia Day on 26^th January traditionally with a BBQ at our friends the Biddles. Unfortunately, Covid decimated the attendees so it ended up just being the four of us but it was a good evening. The next day we were invited to the Gabba with our friends Mel and Bernie. Bernie was a member and we had lunch in the Members First XI Dining room while watching Australia play the West Indies in the second test of 2024. Australia was off to a convincing start and ended the third day looking very comfortable. However, in a thrilling encounter over the next two days, the West Indies emerged victorious, with an exceptional bowling performance from Shamar Joseph securing them an eight-run win. After a lovely long lunch, a lot of wine and a little bit of cricket watching we moved onto the Legends Lounge for a bit more serious cricket watching. It was a great afternoon.

FEBRUARY We went to see Chicago on 1^st February at the Performing Arts Centre with our friends Rebecca and Gavin and one of Katie’s Pilates friends, Megan. We have seen it before, possibly twice, (I can’t remember where) but it was fantastic. That weekend Jessica surprisingly didn’t have anything on the Saturday night so the three of us went out for dinner in the village at Café Meze. The next day Katie and I played our first game of tennis in over a year after her skiing injury. She is still in recovery, so we must play by her Rehab Rules. This means that that ball can bounce several times on Katie’s side of the court but only once on my side, because Katie still can’t run and turn as quickly as in the past. I was also under strict instructions to only hit the ball directly to her forehand. Still, we had a nice game and it was also Pippa’s first trip to tennis. She (and Molly) enjoyed the post-game walk around Oxley Creek.

We went for a lovely dinner with our friends Angela and Gavin at Moda in Caxton Street on 10^th February. It is a delicious Spanish Tapas Steakhouse. In other news, the wine club in our street, Winosaurs, has now done the full length of the street and got back to the starting house again. It will be our turn again soon. We had a wine tasting evening on 16^th February and were all pleased that there were no medical emergencies this time. Trevor, who’d had a cardiac “incident” at the previous event and left in an ambulance, was in good health this time and copped a good ribbing for the disruption he had caused.

Cheers from Derek, Katie, Matt, Jessie, Molly & Pippa