Noumea and The Great South

New Caledonia

Driving 
Driving of course is on the right hand side of the road.  If you're planning on arriving at night from Australia (which drives on the left) and driving the 50kms from the airport to Noumea plus your night vision is as poor as mine it might be simpler to drive into a tree straight away and save yourself the possibility of far worse later.

There is really only one good road in New Caledonia and that's between Tontouta airport and Noumea.  New Caledonians who never see good roads elsewhere think this is a perfect opportunity to drive as fast as possible.  And why not?  There are no policemen on the highways and everyone else is doing it.

Our host Patrick himself said that this was the driving style de rigeur and proceeded to demonstrate this when showing us around in his late model BMW.  In town drive reasonably slowly, but everywhere else as fast as you want.  I think the NC driving style comes from France more than anywhere else. 

Given the quality of the highway from Tontouta the corresponding signage is not at the level one might expect.  Especially around Noumea we found ourselves going into the town centre and coming back out in a frustrating circle as we tried to decipher the puzzling and minimalist signage.

Currently the population is small so accidents are probably few. 

Tailgating is also common but that seems to be everywhere.

Food
Supermarkets are regularly dotted along the highways.  Apart from the enormous Carrefours and Casinos, the little marche's facades all appear differently and all seem in dilapidated condition.  Bread is cheap and consists of the typical long French baguette 99% of which are made of white flour.  Fruit and vegetables are often imported and expensive.  Patrick our host suggested that this was a definite opportunity for an enterprising market gardener.  Meat is more expensive than Australia but seafood is slightly cheaper and probably fresher.  The eggs we ate were of better quality than those in Australia.

The little marches tend to close at 12 and reopen at 3pm in the afternoon - a rather frustrating practice for the tourist shopper looking to buy lunch.

Tap water is delicious and fresh.  We stayed in Mont-Dore where there is a bottling plant at the spring along the mountain side which sells water around New Caledonia.  Why you would buy a bottle of this or Perrier when you can have the same wonderful stuff from the tap is a puzzle.  We drove to the Dumbea river which has a dam that provides water for Noumea and I have never seen clearer or cleaner water than in that river.

Brisbane Floods

If only the world was like Australia. This week in Brisbane like in other parts of Queensland and Australia there has been a flood disaster. Reaching for hyperbole, the flooding was reported as the greatest flood in Australian history by ABC correspondent Paul Lockyer and the largest ever disaster in the state of Queensland by the premier Anna Bligh. Coverage of the event was extensive. ABC 24 as did Channel Seven covered the disaster exclusively for four days or more. Legions of reporters brought us individual tragedies from every angle. The response of the public like in all Australian disasters was incredible. Money flowed and more importantly Aussies got off their bottoms and actually helped to put things back the way they were or at least to the point where the most affected could start to manage on their own. People came with gumboots and shovels to strangers houses and started raking muck.

The constant and dramatic coverage left anyone who lives here with the impression that this was clearly the worst thing that was happening in the world. Yet whilst this was happening in Queensland, thirty two people were killed and three hundred thousand displaced by flooding in Sri Lanka and six hundred died in Brazil. In total so far in Queensland thirty have died and two hundred thousand been affected. Those affected in Sri Lanka and Brazil are the poorest of the poor and arguably have lost far more and have far less hope for the future than citizens of Australia.

My points are these: The media always highlights items of local interest because it knows its viewers are fundamentally more interested in local events than in what is happening to culturally different people far away. That is the nature of the media as well as the viewers and the beast cannot change its stripes.

Secondly, Aussies along with Americans are some of the most practical people in crises I can think of. They wade (pun intended) in to problems with their shirt sleeves rolled up, and a wealth of experience and knowledge of Australian made conditions. This can be attributed to a history of having to solve problems in adverse conditions with little resources or help. Migrants from other countries who have come to Australia more recently than descendants of the settlers also become infused with this frontier spirit.

If only the people of the world were more Australian. If Australia was the world and Sri Lanka and Rio were towns in it, Aussies would be running to help. Services like electricity, phone lines and plumbing would be quickly getting repaired. The homeless would be well fed and housed in emergency centres.

The best example of Aussie determination to put things right after you’ve just been flooded out, burned out or crushed by a tree are the State Emergency Services (the SES). These are some of the most respected people in the community more so than politicians, lawyers, maybe even medical professionals. Why? Because they are the best of the community. The SES are all volunteers, men and women with “real” jobs.

I personally have needed the SES on two occasions in the past two years and not for frivolous reasons either. The first time, I was living in Ferny Hills in the path of an incredibly destructive storm that left the suburb of The Gap a disaster zone. We had no power until it was restored by the SES in driving rain at two a.m. whilst we slept. More recently at the start of the Brisbane floods, a nearby tree about eight metres tall weakened by the constant rain fell on our roof. Two SES crews - ten people from all walks of life, spent three hours in the night again in constant rain first removing the tree and then placing a tarpaulin over the damaged leaking roof section.

Unfortunately, the world is not Australia. The poor of Brazil and Sri Lanka will not see their richer neighbours rushing to help them in the uniforms of the SES. When they are not gripped by fire or flood, Australians see natural disasters in other countries and want to help, the same as they do in their own backyard but can only direct funds to organizations that may or may not use the money wisely.

Back to Oz

Grand Canyon (North Rim)

Yes, after incredible 5 months in the states we are back to Brisbane. I have been asked many times if we regret going to Amerika. What can I say? From San Juan Islands in Washington state down to Grand Canyon in Arizona it is impossible to describe with words the beauty and incredible landscape and climate diversity of this country - you have to see it for yourself. May be it's not the best time for looking for work but the experience we had there is priceless. No, we don't regret at all! And we surely will be back - there is so much more to see! (Besides, our visas are still good until January next year :-))

The Grand Circle Part Three

Hi from Flagstaff Arizona. We're staying at a very comfortable inn that does hot breakfasts, extra comfy pillows and the service was outstanding - the clerk got us a room even though we checked in well before time. This for a third of the price of the hotels in some other locations which had much less going for them because in those locations they were the only hotels. C'est la vie.

Unfortunately the pool here is heavily monopolised (see I'm still using 's' not 'z) by families of loud trolls. I did manage a quick isolated swim for two minutes before one of these families descended on the pool and after vainly attempting to swim in circles around them I surrendered and returned squelching to our room.

This was OK because the room has a 37 inch LCD TV. I started watching one of the many old movies that cable TV promotes as new because they haven't shown it yet. In this case it was Terminator Salvation. We started discussing the number of movies in some big franchises - eg Alien, Terminator and Predator.

Given that there's been cross overs between franchises eg. Aliens vs Predators, why not Terminators vs Predators and Aliens vs Terminators? You read it here first people. Terminator Salvation features a terminator disguised as a human. If memory serves me correctly, Alien Resurrection ends with a cross between Aliens and humans. Terminators vs Predators might feature Terminators returning to the past to capture Predators to clone them with terminator-humans thus capturing the essential predator skills combined with machine like efficiency and the human capacity for sentiment.

Of course this is highly unlikely but so is Sarah Palin being the next president. Or is it?
Anyway off to see the Grand Canyon tomorrow - that should be fun.

The Grand Circle Part Two

A few days ago we visited Capitol Reef National Park. Capitol Reef may not be as popular or as spectacular say Bryce Canyon or Arches but perhaps that's why I liked it.

We went on one of the less popular walks in Capitol Reef, starting at orchards where we picked apricots from trees - the original orchards were planted by Mormon settlers many decades ago and along a small river ending on a rocky outcrop with spectacular views.

This walk had everything I could want in a walk - there were no other people, there was no litter on the trail, and striking scenery including a couple of deer or maybe the same deer on separate occasions. When we got to the top, we sat under a ledge and ate an orange - bliss.

Deer are the kangaroo of America - they are everywhere, and although they have cute big eyed heads, they often end up as roadkill and the redneck community spends time shooting them.

In Arches National Park, there were a lot more people - it is an extremely popular park. Walking the trails we encountered the underprepared - many people doing long hot walks without suitable footwear, hats, water or even shirts; and the unappreciative - a man complained to me that as his wife was mobility impaired he couldn't understand why there wasn't a road leading directly to one of the rock arches (perhaps so that the arch could be viewed in drive-by fashion like so much else here - fast food, banks and shootings).

Caesar Salad

In Las Vegas we were staying in El Cortez Hotel/Casino in Downtown. It was great value for money as we only paid around $30 a night. Besides, we received a voucher book, which included a $5-off voucher for the hotel’s café. Why not use it we thought… Ha, ha, ha… Big mistake.

The next day we went there for lunch. I ordered a caesar salad with grilled chicken. Peter decided to go with the day’s special, which was chicken fried steak and fries. It was an unpleasant surprise when my salad arrived. Now, when I go out to eat I expect my food to be if not delicious at least edible. Is this too much to ask? As far as I can remember, a classic caesar salad includes iceberg lettuce, crispy fried bacon, croutons, hardboiled egg, parmesan cheese and a smooth creamy dressing. In my salad there was no bacon or egg, it was liberally dressed but the dressing was so salty – it was impossible to eat! I thought I might have imagined the saltiness – Peter tried it and also agreed it was very salty. If this was happening to me in the good old Soviet Union I would have probably eaten this salad, swallowing my tears and scared to mention this to the waiter in fear of being verbally abused. But this was happening in a western country so Peter advised me to send the food back. The manager arrived and agreed that the dressing was indeed very salty and that she always has it on the side. She offered to replace my salad with another one and dressing separately. Ok….

Being brought up in the Soviet Union, where customer service practically did not exist, I felt bad about the whole thing like it was me making troubles and bothering the busy people with my silly requests. Anyway, second Caesar Salad arrived in 45min after arriving at the café and after asking the waiter twice. Iceberg lettuce and chicken on the plate and the dressing (same one), croutons and parmesan in individual plastic containers. By that time, Peter had already finished his meal (not fantastic as well, as it turned out but at least edible) and had paid the bill. Good thing is that we had our $5 off voucher and didn’t have to pay the full price. No tips, sorry…

After the worst food experience in America it wouldn’t be fair to not to mention the best one too. Mine, I think, was Brazilian style grilled salmon cooked by my friend’s husband. First, a salmon fillet gets marinated for 20 min in lime juice and sea salt. Then it is grilled on the BBQ on flat cedar wood boards. The heat and the smoke cook the fish. The result is this incredible combination of sweet, salty, citrusy flavours of the fish, which is irresistibly moist and tender… Yum! Peter’s best food experience in America was –surprise! – cook at home $5 pizza from the supermarket. I guess it is really a surprise, when you buy something and expect it to be ordinary turns out to be quite nice and tasty, in fact, better than Domino’s or Pizza Hut.

The end…

The Grand Circle Part One

There is a road trip in Nevada, Utah and Arizona called The Grand Circle. It's one the most scenic road trips in the world. So far we have completed about a third of this journey but have experienced some of the most amazing landscapes, and surprising diversity in topology and plant life (I was expecting desert everywhere).

We left Las Vegas in 40 degree heat with fires occurring around town in the weeks we were there.

Since then we've stayed at Zion National Park, the second most popular site for rock climbers in the US after Yosemite. We visited the North Rim of the Grand Canyon. For those who thought the Grand Canyon lies in the middle of a desert like I did - wrong! The approach to the north rim is through beautiful mixed pine forest containing deer, bears and even bison.

The Grand Canyon itself is a sight that has to be seen to be believed - words and photos do not do it justice.

Whilst the Grand Canyon is on an unimaginable scale the other National Parks on this trip also have equally distinctive and impressive geological formations.

Take Bryce Canyon. Before this trip I had never heard of it and thought that the Three Sisters in the Blue Mountains were quite impressive. After seeing Bryce Canyon I hope that I remember never to try to impress an American with the Blue Mountains.