Leaving le Caillou and a ride in a helicopter

It's 7am on a chilly Wellington morning.  It's great to be home but I also miss the warmth of Noumea (and all our friends!).  We'd love to go down to the beach for a quick swim right now!


Our last week in Noumea was a blast.  A party the night before we moved out of our house, I jumped off a rather large hill and we all went for a heli ride.


Jumping off Ouen Toro was awesome.  A friend and I had been walking past the parapenters for  a long time and had even taken the number of a guy about year prior to our jump.  We'd said we were going to do it and the week before we left Cin organised our jump.  

The views from Ouen Toro are stunning.  After a bit of a hairy start - Cin was seriously running across the tree tops to get going - the rides were gorgeous.  I even saw a turtle pop it's little head up out of the water and dive back down.  I think the best thing about it was the silence.  You can only hear the whoosh of the wind as you swoop over the trees.  And the trees look so different from above.  The whole hill looks like it's covered in green cotton balls!

 Next up in our crazy adventure week was a heli ride out over the lagoon.  I had never been in a heli and had always wanted to so I was incredibly excited!  

Max surprised us all by being completely cool about his ride.  No fear at all, he marched across the tarmac to take his seat.  Earphones on, big smile and we were off!

We went straight out to Amadee lighthouse.  This is a beautiful structure, built in Paris and then shipped out in pieces to be rebuilt in Noumea.  It marks one of the entrances to Noumea's reef.

The best part of the ride was buzzing the reef. The pilot took the heli down so low that we could almost feel the spray from the waves crashing under us.  Then we whizzed along so fast that we all squealed in excitement!




The return trip took us past Ilot Maitre, where we had a gorgeous overnight stay a few months ago and Ilot Canard where I even saw a scuba diver under the water - bubbles expanding up above him!


It was a gorgeous was to say goodbye to this beautiful place.  We all loved it and I thoroughly recommend a flight with Helisud.


The pilot was one of the coolest dudes I've ever met.  He was a former French airforce heli pilot and chewed gum the whole flight.  He even locked up the heli, said good bye to us and then climbed into his beautiful sports car to take off at a good speed to go home!  Max was in awe.

Here's our little Heli-star!  He hasn't put his toy helicopter down since we got home.  Thanks to everyone who contributed to the present. We seriously loved it.  Here's the you tube video!