Epic Places to Paddle - Noumea

If you're not sure where Noumea is, pull it up on Google Maps because if you're Australian it's basically our closest neighbour even though it feels like it could be the other side of the planet.

Noumea is the capital (and only) city of New Caledonia. A 400km long archipelago of islands that sits just under a 2hr flight north east of Brisbane. New Caledonia is an "overseas special collectivity" of France, and unlike places like French Polynesia it really does feel like part of France. From the moment you land there everything is in French. Every car on the road seems to be a Peugeot or Citroen, you drive on the right hand side of the road, the bakeries are full of croissants and baguettes, the supermarkets sell French wine for $5......

But apart from the culture shock you receive for a flight shorter than QLD to Melbourne, the natural beauty of the place is insane. The main island (Grande Terre) is completely ringed by a barrier reef which is in most places kilometres offshore. Creating a gigantic lagoon filled with coral, animals and protecting the island from swell. Inside this reef the island rises almost directly out of the ocean, straight up to 1600m high and covered in jungle.

So the backdrop is stunning, the water is clear and full of life but what is really special about New Caledonia for paddlers is the wind. If you search for the Wind Rose for Noumea you will see that almost every day of the year it blows ESE or SE which is straight along the coast. And it definitely gets windy. Noumea is already a hub for people kitesurfing, windsurfing, foiling and of course outrigger being a pacific island but it does also have a small community of paddlers.

Last time I was there I managed to meet up with the president of the kayak club and was lucky enough that he found the time to take me out in a double ski. Unfortunately there are no dealers on the island so the container they used as their club house was full of personal skis that members had managed to freight privately from all over the world. They had however a long time ago managed to get some double skis so that was our ski for the afternoon.

So we set out from the club which sits in a protected bay on the very southern tip of Noumea and paddled out towards the first set of islands that sat roughly a kilometre of the club and protected the bay. It was windy but too protected for any excitement. Once we got to the islands Christoph asked if I wanted to swap to the front seat and drive the double. Obviously I jumped at the chance. Once we paddled out through the islands we were into the wind properly. There is no swell at all but the sheer size of the lagoon lets the bumps develop into proper bumps. We punched up the lagoon into the wind for a few kilometres until we drew level with a pontoon restaurant that just happens to sit out there in the middle of the lagoon, too early for it to be open but apparently they paddle out there(~6km) have a beer/wine or two and then downwind home.... Sounds pretty good.

Anyway we are sitting about 2km offshore in crystal clear water, with about 6km of downwind in front of us back to the city. Gigantic mountains on our right, sun shining, wind pumping and of course we are the only people out there. We start our way home and it's definitely not the biggest downwind I've ever been in but the bumps for some reason are fast and messy enough to let us keep wiggling our way through rather than just getting stuck in behind. 6km of Downwind flew buy and we swung back into the bay, Christoph with a very large grin on his face.

So just to be clear, the paddling was great but New Caledonia makes the list for epic places to paddle because of the whole package deal.

It's so close, you can literally paddle in Noumea at lunchtime and be home on the sunshine coast for dinner.

The culture shock. Minimal English spoken, everything is in French, not Australian at all.

The food. French Boulangeries, French Cheeses, Wines, all mixed with pacific island seafood and fruits

The scenery, huge mountains, rainforest, reefs, clear water.

The reliability, non stop south easterlies, no swell to worry about.