200 Steps

You can never argue with a free tour. This one took place in Lifou, New Caledonia. It all started so nicely with a tender ride to shore on what soon became a fair ground ride as the waves and wind took control of the boat. However, we did arrive safely, walked past all the long established and customary burger and chip stalls, met with our tour guide and jumped on the bus to the other side of the island, passing lots of waving locals. First stop in this French speaking town was the botanical gardens that specialised in growing vanilla.

I’ll be honest. I was standing near the back of the group and so didn’t really catch what our guide was saying. There was mention of exporting the stuff to make money… I didn’t note any talk of ice cream, however, he did provide a tea party, part way through the talk where I was disappointed to find no vanilla icecream… just coffee. It was tasty though.

Then it was a jump straight back into the bus and over to our second and final destination.

We visited a traditional village where we could have a mooch around a chief’s house. The chief (quite rightly!) always has the biggest house in his village…

This was followed by a walk down 200 steps (I didn’t count… I was told) to one quite beautiful sight…

This I’m pretty sure was worth the journey. The waters really were that colour. Obviously I would have liked to have jumped in that boat grabbed a couple of oars and gone for a row… but regrettably that activity was not on the guides to-do list so I’ll simply have to come back…