ausjackaroo sailing

Noumea Friday 18th June 2023

Amedee Island

Our first port after 2 and half days sailing through reasonably calm waters and the day's temperature's slowly increased to a idealic 26/28 degrees C. During this time we spent quite a few hours sitting on our double balcony (we asked our cabin steward to open the dividing wall between our balconies, which gave us a larger area to socialize).

We were most fortunate to book our shore tour to Amedee Island through our travel agent as the tour had booked out either the first hour or so on board or pre-boarding. It was an all day excursion, leaving the ship in Noumea to bus to the nearby marina where we boarded a high-speed ferry of 30/40 minutes to a little paradise and home to green turtles.

Local government designated the island as a special marine reserve dedicated to managing, preserving and increasing the number and variety of marine plants and animals. Fishing, collecting and disturbing the sea creatures or their environment is prohibited. In 2009 Amedee Island was listed as a UNESCO World Heritage area.

I had intended to snorkel and swim in the lagoon surrounding the island but had heard New Caledonia, especially beaches off Noumea had experienced a string of shark attacks in the lagoons surrounding the popular tourist area. In May 2023 action came in the form of closing the capital's pristine tropical beaches for the year and enforcing a city-wide ban on beach swimming. Hmm... no swimming this time.

Upon landing on the jetty, we walked the short distance to the beautiful white-sand beaches, towered over by the light-house in the centre of this island.

I had already decided that I just had to walk around this pristine island and discover it's natural treasures. It certainly wasn't hard to get lost, the light-house was a constant point of reference as it was always visible over my right shoulder as I circumnavigated clock-wise around. My walk took me a whole 20 minutes!

White sand beach

Plenty of dead coral and drift wood.

Sandy walkway around the island.

Images of lighthouse as I walked.

Natural Flora

Another view as I continued on my walk.

Beacon on the eastern section of the island.

As I walked a group of jet-skiers approached.

Jet-skiers arrived.

Back at the jetty and activity area I found the girls had claimed a few chairs and were soaking up the atmosphere.

Arrived back, now at base of light house.

I saw several native snakes. Very slow moving.

We had a delicious lunch overlooking the lagoon and shortly after were entertained by an island dance show of Pacific Island traditional dance moves.

Fire dance

When we boarded the ferry to the island we were given a coloured wrist band, which designated the tour we were on to view the coral and sea-creatures from the glass-bottom boat. Our tour happened to be the last for the day. Fortunately the seas remained calm and we were fortunate to spot lots of fish, coral and even a few turtles.

Coral seen from boat.

Fish feeding.

Green turtle.

Kay and I on glass bottom boat.

View of island from boat.

Back on board Carnival Splendor we watched from the aft Serenity Bar as we sailed out of Noumea, the ship navigating past the islands and reefs to open water.