My visit to New Caledonia!

Well, the trip to New Caledonia was, like most of what I've seen on this trip, very fascinating! The island is very green but rugged as you can see from this first picture that I took from the plane on our approach. I apologise in that I wasn't able to take very many pictures as it rained every day I was there and not just a brief shower or two!

It turns out that the closest flat area they could find suitable for an airport for Noumea is about 40 kilometres to the north! But at least they have a very decent highway that is currently being upgraded to a 4 lane highway on par with what you would find in North America and I must assume Europe as I have never been there. And that was the beginning of many differences I saw as compared to Indonesia. While the climate is similar (very hot and humid although no where else have I experienced so much rain) nothing else compares!

Motor bikes of any sort are very rare and cars and trucks are common (especially European brands such as Peugeot and Renaud, and a lot of Ford's). They drive on the right too so at many times it felt like driving through the coastal mountains of BC in the summer time. And you do not see people living anywhere there is a bit of flat land. Plus the houses are all of a minimum building standard that do not bring the term "hovel" to mind. Having said that it reminds me of one observation I have made about Indonesia - rarely did I see signs of building craftsmanship! Especially when it came to cement or brick work where rough shod may be too nice a term. The same cannot be said of New Caledonia.

Anyway, my good friend Laurent Sapor (I had met him on my last trip to Western Australia and we have kept in touch since) met me at the airport and then drove me to the Goro construction site. There I stayed the next few days, based in the construction camp. In this next photo the camp is outside the view, to the right. We are looking south towards the bay that is host to the port being constructed for the mine. The road in the forefront is the access to the mine which is behind. And the processing plant is to the left. They still have a lot of work to do but the word is that they expect construction to be about done come November.

I spent 2 days presenting a Datamine training course to a group of people from Exploration, including Laurent. This next picture is of a portion of the exploration camp, located a half hours drive from the construction camp, close to a lake and within a grove of pine trees within the shadow or a large ridge of ultramafic rock. Much of the island is underlain by an ophiolite complex (upper mantle thrust up onto the upper crust through tectonic action). It is these ultramafic rocks that, due to the extensive rain, have been transformed into earthy mud enriched in nickel as much of the original rock has been dissolved and carried away. Most of what is left is just iron oxides and so everywhere it is orange to dark red in color.

The exception is the upper crust that now is almost pure iron oxide (usually goethite, an iron oxide containing water). It is hard and black to dark gray in colour and does not lend itself to being a very good environment for plant growth. One exception is a rare tree that can grow in this environment and as a result survive to a very ripe old age (hundreds of years) as it is safe from the ravages of the many forest fires (either it rains a lot or not at all for extended periods of time). This last picture is of Laurent in front of one of these trees. You can see some of the mine development in the background.

My last evening in New Caledonia was spent in Noumea where I stayed at the Ramada hotel. Laurent and his wife Sandy (see the photo to the left that they were kind enough to give to me as I forgot to take one of them!) invited me to join them for dinner at a seaside restaurant (actually it is on stilts right out onto the bay) where we had an excellent meal. Of all the places I have seen, other than Sydney, none have left we with such a positive impression as has Noumea and New Caledonia, once I got over the embarrassment of not being able to speak french! And on that note here is an interesting piece of trivia - all of the stop signs say "Stop". And when I asked Laurent and Sandy about this they were surprised (they both born in France) as "stop" is an accepted French word!